Pines of Parkstone

BH13
BH13 is defiantly an unlucky 13 for this exclusive Parkstone, Poole Postal code area.  This place is set to burn.

Parkstone is part of a sprawling sea side conurbation, formed by three major towns, being very close together, along the south coast of the UK; and having become just one big urban lump, but with each town insisting on its own independent status, which makes getting here just that little bit more tricky, since you can not refer to the Lump by just one name. 

BH13 is classed as part of Poole, which is the poshest of the three main towns, in the conurbation & this particular bit of Parkstone, is its poshest bit.

Like everywhere else here; BH13 is completely over run with Pines and other highly flammable evergreen trees.  Looking round this area; people have little else in their massive gardens, other than tall twisting Pine Trees & pretty much every garden has lots of them.  Right up to the eves, windows and doors of their houses.

Pretty much everything here is evergreen and most of it Pine.

The Stone or Maritime Pine Pinus Maritima is the one that grows abundantly on the Mediterranean coast, like in the South of France.  Its the one that they get the Pine nuts from.

Pinus Maritma along with many other species of Pine needs fire as part of it's reproductive cycle; when the woods burns, it becomes hot enough for the Pine cones to open and to drop their seeds to enable the next quick growing generation to take root.

fire also eliminates much of the competition and might explain why there are barely any of our native deciduous trees or wild flowers here.

Basically its in the Pine trees best interests to burn, and the older they get; the more flammable they become.  from the dry, dead slow rotting twigs and branches to the ignitable dry Pine-needle leaf litter, which covers the forest floor. 
These trees have evolved to encourage fire, which not just burns down all the other trees, but will scour and burn the topsoil as well. 

People here have many tales to tell about heath fires & it doesn't take much driving about here, before you start noticing the odd scorched bit.

A huge, uncontrollable fire here is inevitable, just like in California, The Mediterranean and in Australia.  I bet when it comes it takes quite a few of these 3 million pound houses with it.

Parkstone Golf Course
My late Grandad used to live here and back onto this golf course.  He has been gone for quite some time now, I used to come here, when I was very little.  My Grandad was born in 1900, so if he was still alive; he would be coming up to his 112th birthday.

As you can see, from these pictures; Parkstone golf course, like everywhere else here is completely Pine!
How can and area become so over run so quickly?

People here say that its because of the strange yellowish sandy soil here and the mild climate.  But I am not convinced that this problem is safely contained here. 

Walking around Poole is like being in a different part of the world.  It is not like the rest of the country.  Everywhere else is light green, here is dark green. 

The contagion spreads right down to the bottoms of the sea cliffs and way inland, to many outlying areas.

To me the problem seems to be spreading and in tree terms; its spreading fast.

With every year that nothing is done about it; the pine army spreads and begins to take over and brings fire to new areas and could threaten to take over a great deal more land than it currently occupies today.  maybe even the whole of the South.  Maybe even the whole country.