Grants

Landscape Regeneration

Moor Trees, Year 2

£10,000 awarded

Project Dates: 15.04.24 to 15.04.25

Supporting this exemplary community tree nursery for a second year to enable them to sow, grow, and plant more local provenance tree species – aiming to increase the quantity, quality, and diversity of native trees planted in Dartmoor and South Devon.

Following the success of Moor Trees’ work last year, this year’s grant will help them to continue to enhance Dartmoor’s ecosystem – working alongside organisations such as Plymouth and South Devon Community Forest, Dartmoor National Park, the Duchy of Cornwall, and others to directly address historic deforestation of Dartmoor by propagating and planting locally-sourced trees.

This year Moor Trees will prioritise the Wayfaring Tree, Devon Whitebeam, Wild Service Tree, and Small-leaved Lime species that play a crucial role in woodland health – providing vital habitat, food, and shelter for diverse wildlife. Their scarcity threatens future regeneration, thereby diminishing woodland resilience.

Project deliverables include:

  • Planting at least 10 species per planting scheme, while engaging communities in each stage from seed collection to woodland creation
  • Cultivating 7,000 trees (from 63,000 to 70,000 saplings)
  • Optimising Moor Trees’ specialist expertise, and building on their knowledge and success in stratification and cultivation of diverse native broadleaved tree species.

 

Image credits: Moor Trees

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IMPACT SUMMARY MAY 2025

Project Activities:

 

  • An exceptional seed collection season (processing over 653,000 seeds) and nursery improvements led to nearly 90,000 trees being cultivated by summer 2024.
  • Community Engagement: A Citizen Science project involved 21 participants for 185 hours. Eleven seed collecting sessions engaged 81 people for 474 hours. The largest planting season involved 313 individuals contributing 2,695 hours.
  • The volunteer base increased from 250 to 613 in 12 months.
  • The project created 22 hectares of new woodland and growing 32 native species.

 

Project Impact:

  • The project focused on little known Wayfaring Tree, Devon Whitebeam, Small-leaved Lime, and Wild Service Tree, leading to Increasing knowledge of these underrepresented broadleaf species.
  • Volunteers and community members involved gain understanding of the project and its goals and objectives, and find the work empowering.
  • The project contributed towards Greenhouse Gas reduction by planting over 31,000 trees, estimated to capture significant carbon.