The Ash Archive is a project founded in 2019 to restore

ash trees ''Fraxinus'' (), commonly called ash, is a genus of plants in the olive and lilac family, Oleaceae, and comprises 45–65 species of usually medium-to-large trees, most of which are deciduous trees, although some subtropical species are evergr ...

to the landscape in England. English ash trees experienced massive dieback beginning in 2012 as a result of a fungal pathogen, ''

Hymenoscyphus fraxineus ''Hymenoscyphus fraxineus'' is an ascomycete fungus that causes ash dieback, a chronic fungal disease of Fraxinus, ash trees in Europe characterised by leaf loss and crown forest dieback, dieback in infected trees. The fungus was first scientific ...

''. The archive contains over 3,000 trees, all of which propagated from the

shoot Shoot most commonly refers to: * Shoot (botany), an immature plant or portion of a plant * Shooting, the firing of projectile weapons * Photo shoot, a photography session; an event wherein a photographer takes photographs Shoot may also refer t ...

s of trees that had demonstrated some resistance to the fungus. The archive was established with £1.9 million (about USD 2.5 million) in government funding, and followed a five-year project to identify ash trees that were resistant to the fungus. One of the final trees in the archive was planted in January 2020 by

Nicola Spence Nicola Jane Spence (born 22 February 1961) is the Chief Plant Health Officer and Deputy Director for plant and bee health at the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. Early life and education Spence was educated at The Mount S ...

, the Chief Plant Health Officer of the UK government. Spence said, "I'm delighted to acknowledge the successes of the Ash Archive project and welcome the International Year of Plant Health by planting an ash dieback-tolerant tree." The Ash Archive trees were planted in the county of

Hampshire Hampshire (, ; abbreviated to Hants.) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South East England. It is bordered by Berkshire to the north, Surrey and West Sussex to the east, the Isle of Wight across the Solent to the south, ...

in an unspecified location by the

Future Trees Trust The Future Trees Trust is a charity that aims to improve and increase the stock of hardwood trees in Britain and Ireland. History The British and Irish Hardwoods Improvement Programme (BIHIP) was established in 1991 with the aim of improving and i ...

. Propagated shoots came from trees in

East Anglia East Anglia is an area of the East of England, often defined as including the counties of Norfolk, Suffolk and Cambridgeshire, with parts of Essex sometimes also included. The name derives from the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of the East Angles, ...

. All the trees will be monitored for five years to identify those that are the most resistant to disease. These will form the basis of the future breeding program.

References

Environmental mitigation Reforestation {{Environmental-org-stub