Sycamore trees are being hit by a devastating disease brought on by warmer weather, the National Trust warns today in its review of the year.
After record breaking temperatures in 2022, the trees familiar to children from their ‘helicopter’ seeds – are being attacked by Sooty Bark Disease, the charity warns.
Sycamore trees were one of the ‘losers’ of the past 12 months, the Trust said in its annual review of the year.
The year saw a warm, unsettled, wet and dull spring, with the warmest May on record, followed by a cooler than average summer, and the wettest September on record for 10 English counties – though there were drier conditions elsewhere.
The year was overall mild and wet trees also suffered from being battered by the storms that ‘bookended’ the year.
Flooding hit Avebury Manor in Wiltshire for the first time in 300 years in January and Charlecote Manor in Warwickshire flooded eight times in 2024, while rain and lough levels submerged jetties for six weeks in the summer at Crom, Northern Ireland.
Storm Bert and a sharp dip in temperatures in November delivered a ‘multi-hazard weather event’ which led to heavy floods, particularly in Wales, and snow, while Storm Darragh brought down hundreds of trees across National Trust properties, the charity said.
The cool, wet start to the year saw bluebells flower later, while mild temperatures in September and October led to a late arrival of autumn and continued grass growth.
The National Trust also said some gardens were now seeing early flowering in December, with camelias in Cornwall, snowdrops two weeks early in Dorset, and even blossom peaking through on apple trees.
Sycamore trees are being hit by a devastating disease brought on by warmer weather. Picture: the Sycamore Gap
Sycamore trees were one of the ‘losers’ of the past 12 months. Pictured: King Charles under the Old Sycamore at Dumfries House
Ben McCarthy, head of nature conservation at The National Trust, said insects including butterflies and bees suffered due to the fluctuations in temperatures along with some birds that struggled to get their breeding season under way.
Mr McCarthy said that in the last few weeks, conditions seesawed from freezing to ‘balmy’ and raised concerns about what that would be doing to species such as hedgehogs and bats which are trying to hibernate.
‘The biological impacts this has on these species is really quite significant,’ he said, adding: ‘We have other impacts like significant rainfall which causes localised flooding, which is impacting other species.’
The trust warned that sooty bark disease poses a threat to sycamores. In the east of the country 60 sycamore trees have been killed and as climate change brings more hot dry weather, the disease could start hitting more trees.
Spreading via airborne spores, the fungus is widespread in the environment where it usually lives as a saprotroph on deadwood, but becomes an active pathogen when sycamore is weakened by severe drought.
The fungus infects the cambium – the main living tissue of the tree – and appears to kill the tree from the base upwards. Trees severely infected will die rapidly in as little as six months
Present in the UK since 1945 the disease has not yet been a real problem, but due to warming temperatures and more frequent dry spells it is now popping up at various places.
John Deakin, the Trust’s Head of Trees and Woodlands commented: ‘So far, the disease only appears to be in the east of the UK (traditionally one of our driest areas of the country) and pockets of the southeast.
‘There is currently still enough moisture in the ground elsewhere to ensure it isn’t yet spreading to other areas, but if temperatures continue to rise resulting in increasingly more periods of drought, we are likely to see the disease spread.
‘Therefore, it’s really important we keep an eye on things.’
