There are 60 or more trees in Britain that are native, meaning tree species, subspecies or hybrids that have established themselves without the hand of man. Yet only 35 are widespread meaning that the palette is actually quite limited, particularly when the full range of benefits from woodlands are considered, together with threats from environmental change.
Sixty may appear a large number of tree species but only about 35 are widespread and of these only three are conifers: juniper, scots pine and yew. The following list of native British trees is taken from my book The New Sylva (Bloomsbury Publishing 2014).
Common name | Latin name |
| Field maple | Acer campestre |
| Common alder | Alnus glutinosa |
| Strawberry-tree | Arbutus unedo |
| Silver birch | Betula pendula |
| Downy birch | Betula pubescens |
| Box | Buxus sempervirens |
| Hornbeam | Carpinus betulus |
| Dogwood | Cornus sanguinea |
| Hazel | Corylus avellana |
| Midland hawthorn | Crataegus laevigata |
| Hawthorn | Crataegus monogyna |
| Spindle | Euonymus europaeus |
| Beech | Fagus sylvatica |
| Alder buckthorn | Frangula alnus |
| Common ash | Fraxinus excelsior |
| Sea buckthorn | Elaeagnus rhamnoides |
| Holly | Ilex aquifolium |
| Juniper | Juniperus communis |
| Crab apple | Malus sylvestris |
| Scots pine | Pinus sylvestris |
| Black poplar | Populus nigra subsp. Betulifolia |
| Aspen | Populus tremula |
| Wild cherry | Prunus avium |
| Bird cherry | Prunus padus |
| Blackthorn | Prunus spinosa |
| Plymouth pear | Pryrus cordata |
| Sessile oak | Quercus petraea |
| Pedunculate oak | Quercus robur |
| Purging buckthorn | Rhamnus cathartica |
| White willow | Salix alba |
| Goat willow | Salix caprea |
| Grey willow | Salix cinerea |
| Crack willow | Salix fragilis |
| Bay willow | Salix petandra |
| Purple osier | Salix purpurea |
| Almond willow | Salix triandra |
| Common osier | Salix viminalis |
| Elder | Sambucus nigra |
| English whitebeam | Sorbus anglica |
| Common whitebeam | Sorbus aria |
| Arran whitebeam | Sorbus arranensis |
| Rowan | Sorbus aucuparia |
| Bristol whitebeam | Sorbus bristoliensis |
| Devon whitebeam | Sorbus devoniensis |
| Service-tree | Sorbus domestica |
| Round-leaved whitebeam | Sorbus eminens |
| Irish whitebeam | Sorbus hibernica |
| Lancastrian whitebeam | Sorbus lancastriensis |
| Grey-leaved whitebeam | Sorbus porrigentiformis |
| Arran service-tree | Sorbus pseudofennica |
| Rock whitebeam | Sorbus rupicola |
| Somerset whitebeam | Sorbus subcuneata |
| Wild service-tree | Sorbus torminalis |
| Bloody whitebeam | Sorbus vexans |
| Wilmott’s whitebeam | Sorbus wilmottiana |
| Yew | Taxus baccata |
| Small-leaved lime | Tilia cordata |
| Large-leaved lime | Tilia platyphyllos |
| Wych elm | Ulmus glabra |
| Field elm | Ulmus minor |
The timeline used to define ‘native’ is about 8,000 years ago (6,100BC), when Doggerland—the land-bridge linking Britain to mainland Europe—disappeared when a catastrophic tsunami is thought to have swept a wave up to 10m tall as far as 25 miles inland (see Smith et al. 2014 below).
The list of what is considered a native species, or indeed a separate species or not, is under constant review by botanists. For example, while 17 trees from the Sorbus genus are listed in the table above, these are only the most widespread, as there are thought to be about 17 more present in tiny populations (e.g. a single Welsh valley). Tim Rich is one of the most active botanists working to disentangle the genus (See Rich et al. 2014 below).
Our cousins in North America find the British definition of ‘native’ intriguing, the time boundary generally adopted by them being when European settlers first arrived in the sixteenth century, just 400 years ago.
Just across the English Channel in France and there are dozens more tree species considered native including silver fir (Abies alba), European larch (Larix decidua), cornelian cherry (Cornus mas), and Norway maple (Acer platanoides), to name a few.
Some trees introduced a long time ago to Britain are now considered ‘naturalised’. There is a specific term for species present since 1500; an ‘archaeophyte’. Such species include beech (native only to south-eastern Britain), horse chestnut, sweet chestnut, sycamore and walnut.
References
T. C. G. Rich, D. Green, L. Houston, M. Lepší, S. Ludwig, and J. Pellicer (2014). British Sorbus (Rosaceae): six new species, two hybrids and a new subgenus.
New Journal Of Botany Vol. 4 , Iss. 1. http://dx.doi.org/10.1179/2042349714Y.0000000036
D.E. Smith, S. Shi, R.A. Cullingford, A.G. Dawson, S. Dawson, C.R. Firth, I.D.L. Foster, P.T. Fretwell, B.A. Haggart, L.K. Holloway, D. Long, (2004). The Holocene Storegga Slide tsunami in the United Kingdom, Quaternary Science Reviews, Volume 23, Issues 23–24, December 2004, Pages 2291-2321, ISSN 0277-3791, http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.quascirev.2004.04.001.