"We can change things in the forest, but certainly not everything"

The forest remains seriously ill. If you take a walk in the countryside, you will hardly be able to miss it: haggard treetops, clearings where there used to be thickets, clear-cut aisles. More than eight out of ten trees in Luxembourg are damaged, and more than six out of ten are severely damaged or already dead. While the proportion of healthy trees – 14.5 per cent – has remained stable over the past four years, the proportion of severely damaged trees in particular continues to rise.

It is now five years since we took a walk through a forest with forester Serge Hermes, where he introduced us to a whole range of different methods to combat forest dieback: leaving dead wood lying around to act as a water reservoir – this is how even dead plants help their still-living neighbours through dry summers. The "assisted migration" of local species that are genetically better adapted to drought, which is particularly popular in France, or even the import of exotic tree species. Luxembourg's forest management also relies on the theory that the genetic diversity of plants already present here is so broad that the individuals that are adapted will increasingly prevail. In Luxembourg's forests, a little bit of everything is tried out, because it is almost impossible to predict what will work.