Can Someone Explain Please....

[ToraToraTora]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-68133750

"He said that would amount to about 10 million tree seedings being ripped up and burnt with perhaps the same happening again next year if the funding allocation remains the same." - why? why can't they be left to grow? Is this just a hissy fit?

[naomi24]

Presumably he'll use the land for something else.  He's in business.  He needs to make a living.  He can't just abandon his land to trees.

[davebro3]

They are just saplings and need to be planted out where they are needed. They wouldn't grow properly if left close together as they are.

[ToraToraTora]

ok but why do they need to be burned?

[Canary42]

It's certainly not made clear - presumably it relates to ongoing maintenance although it's difficult to see what's wrong with just leaving them. It does sound a bit hissy

[Canary42]

Crossed posts. Much clearer now.

[ToraToraTora]

I think he's just dramatising it for effect. Burning would be very bad just pull them up and compost them FGS!

[davebro3]

Sounds as if the Scot Nats have over-reached themselves in trying to go "green" & cocked up the budget (so what's new?).

Of course Westminster is to blame!

[Canary42]

Yes, a trifle ironic that he wants to burn them given his alleged concern about climate change 😁.

[ToraToraTora]

Well St Urgeon has got £600k down the back of her sofa!

[Redhelen72]

Have you seen the picture? they are planted neck and neck so cannot be left like that as it will encourage disease and pests - they grow cheek by jowl until a couple of years old and are then planted out to allow them to grow and spread.

[davebro3]

I'm no gardener but can wood be composted? Running them through a chipper would just cost more money.

[naomi24]

Harvesting them and chipping them would cost a lot of money - money that isn't recoverable.  I imagine they'll just burn the fields as they are. 

[ToraToraTora]

11:14, I get that but why do they have to be "burned"?

[Redhelen72]

Pines are fairly acidic and take a long time to break down and would change the ph of the soil if left to break down slowly - I would imagine that by burning them they can at least add the ashes back into the soil without to much damage to the PH.

 

[naomi24]

TTT, see my post at 11.19.

[ToraToraTora]

they don't have to chop them, leave them in a heap to compost.

The PH may be an issue but I'd have thought the release of carbon would be more of a worry.

[naomi24]

To leave them in a heap he has to employ people to harvest them and pile them on to land he needs for whatever he's going to do in the future.  That will cost him money that he can't recover and space that he probably can't afford to allocate for no return.  Actually, as a businessman, he must be worried sick about his future.  I would be.

[Canary42]

That's the whole problem with society today, everything has to be turned into a profit-making business.  There should be a balance.

[naomi24]

Canary, he's already spent out on buying seeds and employing people to plant them and tend them so all of that outlay has been for nothing.  He's not a charity and I doubt he has pockets so deep he can afford to throw that much money away. 

[nicebloke1]

Ruddy hell, money trees for sure.