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Just wondering what partical experiences from anyone working in estates or countryside management has with dealing with the issue of children climbing trees - protected and otherwise.
Andrew Böber
CMIOSH
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Rank: Guest 
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When I was a kid my playground was the local church grounds which was surrounded by conker trees. These we climbed day in day out over the summer holidays. During the Autumn the vicar would give us a shilling a day to pick up the leaves (we had all the conkers).
No-one ever fell out of a tree or suffered a trip on an exposed root. Those were the days.
Now? - need I spell it out. The kids are wrapped in cotton wool, they can't play outside without supervision, they can't do anything such is societies fear of litigation.
I work across two schools with extensive grounds and trees. We keep the kids active with football and other games during play and free time as well indoor clubs. Hence we have never had an instance of kids climbing trees.
Joe
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Rank: Super forum user 
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Originally Posted by: Andrew Bö  Just wondering what partical experiences from anyone working in estates or countryside management has with dealing with the issue of children climbing trees - protected and otherwise.
Andrew Böber
CMIOSH Let them play
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Rank: Forum user
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Rank: Super forum user 
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Hi Andrew,
We have a large number of trees on our grounds, though not many children, protected or otherwise :-). We don't have (as far as I know) an issue with kids climbing them, but there are some general principles we apply, based I must say on the case law and enforcer's guidance you quote:
Where trees impinge on formal access areas, such as car parks, footpaths and so on we manage them for safety; in our case that's mainly about applying carefully directed chain-saws in expert hands to stop bits falling off at the wrong time.
Where trees are in a 'natural' woodland we tend to leave them alone, applying in particular the principles in Tomlinson vc Congelton MBC.
At my previous employer we had a problem with people using an area of woodland on our grounds for occasional barbeques and camping, the starting point for dealing with that was to assert our rights and point people to the lawful public footpath, rather than giving them the idea that they were free to use our woods as public property.
All in all, I think with judicious and sparing use of signs and information boards, children can be left to fall out of trees in wooded areas with relative impunity from your perspective, though I might expect controls in areas where the public is invited and which are not in any approximation to a state of nature,
John
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Rank: Forum user 
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Hi Andrew Have you had a look at the Visitor Safety in the Countryside Group website? http://www.vscg.co.uk/go...d/tree-safety-managementMembers include Forestry Commission, Environment Agency, National Trust, Royal parks and Woodland Trust so I would think that following their guidelines would provide you with a fair defence in court if it ever came to it. It is also very interesting the way they zone areas for different levels of action. Jeni
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Rank: Super forum user
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I have dealt with a number of deaths over the years re children climbing trees in public parks and thankfully coroners and similar have taken the sensible and common sense approach. also note that we kill many hundreds and maim many thousands of children on our roads each year so look at what is reasonable and practicable e.g. ensure that your trees are healthy etc as children will climb trees irrespective
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Rank: Super forum user
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bob youel wrote:I have dealt with a number of deaths over the years re children climbing trees in public parks and thankfully coroners and similar have taken the sensible and common sense approach. also note that we kill many hundreds and maim many thousands of children on our roads each year so look at what is reasonable and practicable e.g. ensure that your trees are healthy etc as children will climb trees irrespective I remember my dad teaching us the best way to climb trees, he fell from the top branches, hitting every branch on the way down and was in agony for weeks (it was 5 days after he had had a tripple heart bipass op). He wouldn't go to the DR's in case they thought he was daft. I would never think about looking at anyone else for fault if I or my children fell from a tree. Trees are there to be climbed, the only way to stop people climbing them is to cut them all down or barrier them all off.
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Rank: Super forum user
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Andrew,
I have sent you private mail....
Phil
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Rank: Super forum user 
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I'm fine with tree climbing but I am often disgusted by the wanton vandalism and destruction of trees, with ripped branches, stripped bark, etc. etc. The poster also asks about protected trees, and I guess the options should include information signs at least. In extreme cases, a fence might be the only option, and I'd be fine with that. We should respect our elders.
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Rank: Super forum user 
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I was a tree climbing expert for many years during my youth. I even carried on climbing after my best mate fell from about 20ft high when a branch he was bouncing on snapped. He has no memory of that apart from waking from unconciousness in hospital with a few cracked ribs and a fractured leg.
That was late 50's, and we were really fit and healthy then.
Unfortunately kids can't climb trees anymore due to "elf and safety".
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Rank: Super forum user
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Just to reassure everybody suffering from 'elf n'safety' and 'yoof of today' syndromes; kids do still climb trees, I know because I've seen my partner's young niece and nephew up trees within the last year or so.
The point is that there has always been a duty of care to manage access to certain trees in some circumstances, the only thing that has changed is that since (in particular) Tomlinson vs Congleton MBC that duty has become clearer and slomewhat less onerous,
John
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Rank: Guest
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Dependant on the status of the land you are looking after you can fence off, patrol, educate and inform.
If the area is private land you can put up prohibition notices, fences and manage the woodland to make the trees harder to climb this can be through tree management, or under canopy planting of native shrubs that form natural boundaries (spikey plants!). This is a costly exercise takes a while and is hard to prove whether or not it works. If done correctly though it can increase teh biodiversity of the area.
If the land is designated recreational (public) space again signage, if there is a bylaw prohibiting tree climbing as there often is then it makes it possible for patrols to have a bit of bite about them..
You are never going to stop it happening, all you can do is prove that you have considered options, taken reasonably practicable measures to stop the activity, and made attempts to mitigate the risk of injury.
Where I used to work we had mountainboarders and skateboarders undermining trees to create mogual jumps. In the end we fenced the bit of the boundary where we knew they were coming in, felled the undermined tress and used the timber to obstruct other unauthorised entry points. After the second visit with teh digger to relevel the ground they gave up and went down to the official area provided.
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