RHS tree scientist to help gardeners combat climate change

A new, five-year fellowship has been jointly funded by the RHS and by Frank P Matthews Nursery and will aim to identify trees that will perform well in the future amid more extreme weather events and an increasingly changing climate.

The tree scientist will be based at the prospective Centre for Horticultural Science and Learning at RHS Garden Wisley in Surrey, due to open in 2020/21. The research conducted will provide gardeners, industry and policy-makers with official planting guides specific to varying climate scenarios.

As with other garden plants, trees can play a vital role in providing environmental services such as mitigating flooding, helping cool urban areas and capturing harmful carbon and pollution.

Head of environmental horticulture at the RHS, Mark Gush, said: “By virtue of their diversity and size, as well as their unique structural and functional attributes, trees have the capacity to deliver multiple ecosystem services at various levels of effectiveness."

Read our article on the best plants to use in a changing climate. For more information about the position head to the RHS's opportunities page.