Fontainebleau Forest: Oak, a “formidable competitor” in the face of global warming

The painters of the Barbizon school surely already sketched it, some two hundred years ago. Green, bushy, firmly anchored in the ground. Healthy, from roots to crown. This oak, located on the edge of the forest, has now become bald, amputated from its crown (the top of a pruned tree). A few bare, dry, and stunted branches—those that have not fallen to the ground—still point toward the sky. While the 25,000 hectares of the Fontainebleau massif (in Seine-et-Marne and Essonne) may at first glance appear verdant, one of the largest French forests is fully suffering from the consequences of global warming. And all the species that compose it are affected, regardless of the age of the trees.

When the deputy head of the territorial unit of the National Forestry Office (ONF) in Fontainebleau, Alexandre Butin, walks the trails of the massif, he increasingly comes across