EXPERT foresters from across England and Wales visited Oxfordshire-based Earth Trust yesterday, to learn about research into protecting national woodland.

Their stop in Paradise Wood, Little Wittenham, was part of a four-day study tour of woodland in Buckinghamshire and Oxfordshire organised by educational charity, the Royal Forestry Society (RFS).

The Earth Trust’s site, where 60,000 trees have been planted since 1993, boasts a wide variety of hardwood timber, with RFS communications officer Wendy Necar calling it “a fabulous setting for learning”.

The society’s chief executive, Simon Lloyd, said the Earth Trust’s work was vital to the long-term health and resilience of the UK’s woodlands, which are increasingly threatened by pests, disease and climate change.

He said: “The RFS strongly supports the Earth Trust’s work and has a major role in disseminating the learning emerging from their research.”

The Earth Trust, in collaboration with other organisations, has established a number of forestry trails in Paradise Wood, which have evolved to become the largest collection of hardwood forestry trails in Britain.

The chief executive of the Earth Trust Jayne Manley said: “Paradise Wood is a living gene bank and the research we carry out here will help foresters across the UK and Ireland plant the right trees in the right places in the future.”