The first trees are in the ground at Cornwall Wildlife Trust’s West Muchlarnick site, marking the beginning of an ambitious 50‑year project to restore temperate rainforest in south east Cornwall.
The project will see around 28,000 trees planted across the landscape, transforming lower-grade farmland into one of the rarest and most ecologically valuable habitats on Earth.
January saw the first tree planted by Labour MP for South East Cornwall, Anna Gelderd, alongside Merlin Hanbury-Tenison, a trustee of Cornwall Wildlife Trust. A second planting session was supported by ‘Friends of Kilminorth Woods’, a local community group. The final public planting session welcomed enthusiastic pupils from Polperro Primary Academy getting their hands dirty, the first children to plant trees as part of the new rainforest.