“The trees are gathering, inviting the humans”

The Somerset Conference of the Trees — 150 people gathered at Orchard Park Farm in Hornblotton, organised by Somerset Council — was exactly the kind of event that reminds you why this work matters.

There’s something quietly profound about a conference that starts from the premise that “the trees are gathering, inviting the humans”. Not us convening to discuss trees as a resource or a problem to manage, but being invited in. That framing alone says something important about the shift in how we’re learning to relate to the natural world.

Ben Goldsmith on rewilding. Hugh Warmington on forestry. Workshops in the actual woodland. It isn’t a conference about nature in a conference centre — it is in nature.

What struck me was the breadth of the programme — timber engineering, spirituality, rewilding, ancient trees, dormice, pine martens, bats, orchard land management. And the science of trees runs through all of it — the mycorrhizal networks beneath our feet, the way trees communicate, share nutrients, and respond to their environment with a kind of distributed intelligence that we are only beginning to understand.

Beneath every woodland floor lies mycelium — fungal threads that connect trees to one another in a vast underground network. Through it, trees pass nutrients to struggling neighbours, share water, and send warning signals when under threat. They are a community, in relationship with each other in ways we are only beginning to fully appreciate. Systems-level conversations, rooted in place.

Community resilience isn’t just flood plans and emergency responses. It’s also this — the webs of connection between people, place, trees, and time. Just as mycelium connects and sustains a forest, strong communities are built on the invisible threads between people — the relationships, the shared history, the mutual support.


Conference Programme:

Morning sessions

• 9:15 Introduction to the day: Somerset Council’s Tree Project Officer James Chapman
• 9:20 Timber Engineering: Tree stories (and some grass) — Neil Thomas
• 10:05 Spirituality — Emma Fitchett
• 10:50 Break
• 11:10 Woodland Art — Barney Steele
• 11:50 Forestry — Hugh Warmington
• 12:15 Rewilding — Ben Goldsmith
• 13:00 Panel — All / Steve Mewes

Afternoon

• 13:30 Transfer to woods
• 14:30 Woodland workshops:
  • Tree spirituality — Emma Fitchett
  • Bats and woodland ecology — Sarah Cruickshank
  • Dormice and woodland ecology — Nathan Legall
  • Ancient & Veteran Trees — Barbra Lakin
  • Pine Martens — Lucie Bennett
  • Orchard care / maintenance — Neil MacDonald
• 16:30 Closing remarks