A – Z of British Trees: B is for Beech

Stately Beech trees – Queens of the Wood. Photo by Mike Hall.

The Beech, Fagus sylvatica, tall and majestic with stunning autumn foliage, is one of my favourite trees.  It is found throughout Europe on mainly chalky soils, in either their ‘common’ or purple’ form, and can be found as stately isolated specimens in woods, or a lovely thick hedge, or as decorative specimens in parks.

Purple and Copper Beech trees lining the River Nith

Although it is thought they were introduced by the Romans, pollen records suggest that they have been in the UK since the last Ice Age, around 10,000 years ago.

Generally Beech trees have smooth, thin, silver-grey bark and edible (in small quantities!) beechnuts, or masts, produced by female flowers in the autumn.  These are a valuable source of food for squirrels, deer and mice, and in ‘the olden days’ domesticated livestock, particularly pigs, were released into beech woods to feed on the oil rich beech nuts.  Mature beeches can reach up to 40 metres high topped by a huge, spreading canopy, and their stately grace and elegance has earned the Beech the soubriquet ‘Queen of the Woods’, consort to the ‘Oak King’.  There is a dark side to Beeches, however; their shallow root structure makes them prone to falling over in high winds, and their habit of dropping massive and still living branches, particularly in times of stress or high rainfall, has earned them the dark nickname of ‘Widowmaker’.

Beech wood is used for fuel (the original Yule log is thought to have come from a Beech) and smoking foods such as cheeses, herrings and beer, as well as used for furniture and kitchen utensils.  In folklore, Celtic tradition associates Beech with prosperity, as well as wisdom and the written word and learning – a sentiment embodied in the Celtic ‘lesson of the Beech’ –  ‘Rooted in the knowledge of the ancients, sustained by the ideas of the present, we will continue to reach for the stars’ .  In past times thin slices of Beech wood were used to create the very first books, which were used by the Irish god Ogham to record the first known written alphabet in the UK.

Find out more information about Beech trees at the Woodland Trust site, and there are guides to Beech identification at the Natural History Museum website.

‘Rooted in the knowledge of the ancients, sustained by the ideas of the present, we will continue to reach for the stars’. Photo Mike Hall

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