>They cleared most of the forests for agriculture and kept and 'farmed' the ones they coppiced for fuel for a long time after clearing the rest. When they no lo

>They cleared most of the forests for agriculture and kept and 'farmed' the ones they coppiced for fuel for a long time after clearing the rest. When they no longer felt they needed wood as fuel, they cut down more rather than managing them as they had for hundreds of years. It's not a simple story. There were distinctly regional transitions and pressures from things like the expansion of urban centers that created demand for food which could not be mined unlike fuel that could be both mined and grown. Other factors like the spread of horses for ploughing (displacing oxen) and improvements in agricultural machinery were also important. The growth of distribution networks (canals) was also very important. Still copicing was practiced commercially right into the 20th century, and some copices were not cut back - they were just abandoned. You can see these weird old trees out in the English countryside today. So it's accurate to say "wood as a heat fuel was scare for some people in some places". Conversely it is fair to say that coal displaced some other fuels including wood gradually, and that the use of land for crops other than wood became gradually more attractive. https://www.bahs.org.uk/AGHR/ARTICLES/62_1_WardeWilliamson.pdf https://www.bahs.org.uk/AGHR/ARTICLES/62_1_WardeWilliamson.p...