"I was born in the village, so they just mean so much to me - these woods and the pear tree - and we're just seeing it being destroyed for a stupid train that nobody wants and nobody is going to use. I am so upset. It's a waste of time and money; we are seeing this every day up and down the country, destroying all our trees and our wildlife, and it's just awful."

Those were the words of a local resident as she watched, in tears, as the iconic 250-year-old Cubbington pear tree in Warwickshire was felled by HS2 contractors on 20th October. It seems that nothing of any natural value can now stand in the way of this project.

One cannot help but wonder whether the same would be true were it historic buildings or monuments.

That wonderful tree had grown, blossomed and fruited there since the reign of George III, living through a further 11 monarchs, 63 prime ministers and two world wars before history caught up with it in the most destructive of ways.

This kind of needless ecological vandalism is going on up and

down the 140-mile route of HS2, against the advice of a host of conservation organisations. To quote Oliver Rackham, it's like watching a library being torched by people who never learned to read. As for claims the tracts of woodlands being destroyed will be replanted, Luci Ryan from the Woodland Trust summed it up best: "It's like smashing a Ming vase and replacing it with bargain basement

crockery."

Members of various Extinction Rebellion Surrey local groups recently travelled up to Denham in Buckinghamshire, to deliver supplies to one of the camps where protestors have based themselves to resist and monitor the destruction, and to raise awareness of the damage being done to communities and the environment.

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