hey welcome to UK well crafts so if
you're into foraging or hiking while
camping we spend any amount of time in
the in the forest and I think it's a
really good idea to get to learn the
trees around you because you can make
the woodland feel a lot more like home
if you can just go out identify trees
and see if there's any uses for you like
edibility
or making fire or shelter so first of
all behind me is an English oak quercus
robot which is a very common Terry in
the UK I can grow anywhere up to nearly
40 meters with earlier actually in its
old age can get shorter so it makes it
less likely to be knocked over by the
wind along its lifespan
the bark of the oak is a grayish brown
color and it has very deep ridges and
the fruits of the oak is the Acorn which
sits an eggcup base
the leaves are fairly easy to recognize
they've got undulating lobes and their
image is used on the logos of both the
Woodland Trust and the National Trust
the two most common species of oak that
you're likely to find in the UK are this
one here the English oak quercus robot
and the sesor oak quercus betrayer so
the way that we tell that this one isn't
English oak as we look how the leaves
are attached to the stem so this one
here has very short leaf stem attaching
it to the main branch and the English
oak acorns will have a long stem whereas
si oak is the complete opposite the
leaves will have a long stem and the
acorns will have a short stem the acorns
are edible but they're usually far too
bitter they need to be processed to
remove the tannins so they need to be
crushed soaked in water and then the
tannins leached out that way and that
needs to be processed several times to
make them edible so I don't think the
amount of effort is worth the reward
also the timber of oak is used a lot in
building because it's very strong hazel
was a very common native tree usually
one of the smaller trees found in the
woodland it's got quite distinctive
long straight stems that will come up
right from the base sometimes it has one
main central like trunk with lots of
smaller stems coming from it sometimes
it's like this where they're all fairly
small so the bark is usually like gray
or a bit Brown and on the larger older
stems the bark is often peeling away the
leaves grow ultimately down the stem
the leaves are rounded with a point at
the end and they are doubly - so you've
got the larger serrations and in between
those you've got smaller teeth it leaves
a fairly soft to the touch and that's
because they've got a bounty fur
underneath and also the the leaf stems
are furry as well in winter you'll see
the distinctive male catkins the fruit
of the hazel trees of course the
hazelnut which has to be in my top 5
wild edibles
they usually mature in early September
but you have to be very quick to be the
squirrels to them these branches or
stems are very useful in crafting
because it's very pliable
very bendy they can used in weaving
baskets that sort of whip they're good
in like building fences wattle fencing
I'll use that for and also for if you've
got grown tomatoes you can use them as
canes for growing the tomatoes that this
is common ash fraxinus excelsior which
sounds like sewing up a Harry Potter
book it's one of the most common trees
in the UK and can grow up to 35 meters
the but on younger specimens can be
quite smooth
on older ones it's quite ridged and you
get a a network of crisscross patterns
on the back
in the winter it's quite easy to tell by
the the twigs have the the buds on
mature quite a dark black and it flowers
before the leaves open the leaves of the
ash tree usually appear quite late in
spring usually one of the last trees the
leaves are serrated and their compound
leaves which means many leaflets push
them it's usually between nine and
thirteen first and then they grow in
opposing pairs and then one terminal
leaf fruit the ash tree these ash keys
they are edible but only when very young
the greener the better and they do need
to be pickled you'll find absolutely
loads this time of year in May
trees so it's quite a useful hardwood
and many crafters use it the handles of
making tools especially actors when you
find dead ash there's a very good chance
that you'll find a funghi on there this
is a little black dome that's called
King Alfred's cake Don dog Danny earthen
Centrica it grows almost exclusively on
dead ash and you'll see the concentric
rings when you cut it in half
now this funghi is really good for fire
lighting you can take a spark on to the
fungi once it's dried then it's really
easy to get a fire going and you can
also carry an ember just keep blowing on
it and you can carry the Ember with you
when you're changing camp so you can
easily set up a new fire
Silver Birch has to be one of the
easiest trees to ID in the winter
because of its distinctive bark which is
silver with black striations running
horizontally as the tree gets older it
develops diamond-shaped fissures in the
bark and as it gets older still the base
of the tree gets darker brown and rugged
Silver Birch has both male and female
flowers or catkins the male ones in
groups of two or four and their long
yellow catkins that that hang from the
tree and then female ones are smaller
and green and stand upright and if you
look around
they usually forming around April time
and here are these the ones that have
died and falling off the tree they'll be
all around I'm in May now so they're not
on the tree anymore but all around the
base of the tree there's loads of them
the leaves of the Silver Birch a small
fairly triangular shaped and too
birch bark is really useful for fire
lighting because it contains oils which
are highly flammable someone here has
been cutting it off the tree which I
generally don't do because it can damage
the tree it's actually much easier to
collect it from dead fallen bits of Burt
and I think it works better as well so
yeah then good cutting it off the tree
you can also collect birch sap from
birch trees in early spring which gives
you a nice healthy drink it's a bit like
mineral water but tastes a bit sweeter
you can often find also birch polypore
fungi growing on dead or dying silver
birch trees which is a very useful
mushroom to find you can use it as a
plaster if you peel off the the pause on
the underneath of the mushroom you can
also grind it down and use it for fire
lighting and it's also used for
sharpening blades as well once it's been
sliced and dried so if you're into
bushcraft silver birch is a very useful
tree too now
this is horse chestnut a large
non-native tree they can grow to about
40 meters and will often live for about
300 years the bark when it's young
it's usually quite smooth and grayish
when they get older the bar goes darker
brown and a bit scaly it flowers in May
the flowers have four or five white
petals they go pink at the base the
fruit of the horse-chestnut our conquers
and they develop inside a green spiky
case in autumn the buds a brownish red
and they're sticky
the leaves are par mate they'll usually
have five to seven leaves that radiates
out from the central stem and the leaves
are tubed
so conkers aren't edible but you can use
them if you cut them up and dry them you
can use them as a laundry detergent and
the leaves as well you can also use if
you crush up the leaves and add a bit of
water you can use them as a hand soap
and that's because they contain saponins
which is like a natural form of soap
Beach there's a large native species can
grow above 40 meters
this bark is smooth and gray and can
develop shallow fissures with age if you
see carvings on the bark as a good
chance that you've got a beech tree
because it's got a nice smooth bark
people like to carve their names on it
the fruit of the beech tree are beech
nuts also known as beech mast and it's
another good way of identifying the tree
if you look set the base of the tree and
dig around in the leaf litter you'll
find the discarded shells or casings of
the of the beech nuts
so beach leaves have a rounded oval
shape
and the the margins the edges of the
leaves are wavy and when they're young
they have really fine hairs but as they
get older they lose those hairs and go a
darker green when they're this age when
I still a little bit translucent
they're nice unedible and they make a a
good substitute for lettuce another way
to tell it's a beech leaf is it has
usually around 9 pairs of veins that
grow diagonally down the leaf the
budding arrangement of the beach are
alternate so you'll get leaves on one
side of the branch than the other and
then the other alternating up the sand
beach trees like to grow on free
draining soil so you're if you're in an
area that has a lot of beech trees like
this here then there's a good chance
that you're in a chalk or limestone area
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