Why France manages its trees differently

Last year, one of our four magnificent walnut trees died. This was heartbreaking, as was the process of taking it down. It focused my thoughts on the importance of trees in France and on how the French manage them. 

The image of long, straight roads and towpaths along canals which are shaded by rows of plane trees is iconic. 

The huge hand-shaped leaves provide summer shade and autumn colour. The blue/grey watercolour patchwork of the bark provides year-round visual and tactile delight, and during winter the light slanting through the lattice work of branches enlivens an otherwise monochrome dullness. 

We have Napoleon to thank for this. He picked up on the rows of elm trees planted a couple of hundred years earlier by Henry II and saw that they provided both shade and raw materials for boat and house builders. We are still reaping the aesthetic benefits.

Read more: How to pick and cook asparagus in France

French-style pruning

French gardeners prune and plant trees differently to the UK – specifically they more frequently use pollarding to cut large garden trees back to a stubby framework each spring, allowing twiggy regrowth to provide just enough welcome shade in the garden. 

Trees grown for firewood, basketry or hazelnut harvesting are coppiced. They are cut back to the base, allowing multiple slim trunks to spring up while smaller, evergreen species are shaped to form topiary and hedges. 

Ornamental trees are often planted to a structured plan. You get allées, quinconces (where they are planted in regimented patterns of five trees at a time) and bosquets (where trees are used to create hidden gardens within a larger garden). 

This was used to great effect by André le Nôtre, who designed the gardens of Versailles for King Louis XIV.

Like many incomers to France, we had to learn the importance of wood as a principal form of heating. In the UK, our fireplace was an aesthetic addition to the central heating – in France our woodburning stove became the central heating. 

We had to understand what wood works best in a woodburner and how to acquire and store it. The importance of wood as a fuel makes sense because France has so much woodland – it covers almost one third of the country, with most being privately owned. 

The best wood to use for fuel is hardwood and we order between five and 10 stères of robinia and chestnut each year, pre-cut to the best length for our stove. A stère is a cubic metre of wood when the wood is cut to one metre lengths. 

The art of stacking logs

The wood is stored in a well-ventilated barn behind the house. On sunny days we leave the big doors open to let sunlight fall on the logs to help dry them out, because apart from the type of wood you burn, its humidity is important.

Technically, humidity needs to be less than 20% if the wood is to burn well. Above 25% and it pollutes when burnt and is a much less efficient form of heating. 

It pays to order your wood early in the year – leave it to September and you risk getting young wood because everything older has been sold.

Read more: Discover the charm of Menton lemons and how to grow citrons in France

Finally, stacking logs is an art in itself. When tidily stacked it not only looks good but minimises space and makes it much easier to see just how much wood you have left. 

Two other important points are to make sure you stack it on a solid base and not bare earth, and do not allow the stack to lean against a wall. This is to discourage termites from creating a subterranean nest in the earth beneath the stack. 

The gap between the logs and the wall means that, if this does happen, they cannot easily get into walls of your property and eat structural wood.

Termites are endemic in France and are a topic for another day. Meanwhile, we are busy stacking the logs from our beloved walnut tree and will then wait at least another year before they will be dry enough to burn.