‘The trees are trying to tell us things’: the ecologist championing Britain’s ancient forests

Ted Green, photographed in Windsor Great Park next to the ancient King Offa's oak, which is thought to be over 1,000 years old. Photograph: Alicia Canter/The Guardian

Ted Green is a rebel. He calls sheep “land maggots”. A horse-riding centre is “a dog-food complex”. And the ancient tree expert’s new book includes a photo of him sticking up two fingers at a portrait of Margaret Thatcher.

But the influential, iconoclastic Green, 89, who has lived his whole life around Windsor Great Park and still works as a conservation adviser for the crown estate, is also a staunch advocate for King Charles’s protection of Britain’s unique trove of ancient trees.