Ashlawn School – Science and Leadership College, Rugby has been chosen as one of the first 250 schools to take part in The Conservation Foundation’s Great British Elm Experiment.

Successive generations of pupils will be monitoring and caring for an elm tree over the years from sapling upwards in an experiment to unlock the mystery of why some trees survived Dutch elm disease which killed 25 million elms from the 1960s onwards.

The young trees were sent out during the first week of March, the start of Spring in the International Year of Biodiversity. We were asked to log the elm’s progress over the years on the Conservation Foundation website www.conservationfoundation.co.uk.  Height, girth, biodiversity and any signs of Dutch elm disease will be recorded and it is hoped that with time – and luck - a new generation of elms will become established throughout the country and a new generation will be encouraged to have an interest in elms and biodiversity.

This new national elm planting campaign is using young trees propagated from mature healthy native elms which The Conservation Foundation has discovered still growing in the English countryside. It is part of the 30th anniversary celebrations of Elms Across Europe, the project which led to the setting up of the Foundation by David Shreeve and David Bellamy in 1982.

The Ashlawn Elm is now being monitored and reported on by Miss Voglers Geography club.