Transplant feasibility report: deciding, tree by tree, what can actually be moved.

A tree-wise assessment covering species, girth, age, health, rooting habit, access for machinery and the proposed receiving site, ending in a recommendation for each tree: retain, transplant or remove. It also states the preparation lead time and method for the trees recommended for moving.

Because Tree Authorities increasingly expect transplantation to have been examined before felling is sought, and because the construction programme depends on the answer. A feasibility report filed with the application makes the case concrete rather than a general assurance that transplantation was considered.

Very large girth relative to what can be lifted, advanced age, a deep tap root, disease or structural decay, heavy root entanglement with foundations or services, and no machinery access. Any of these can make a move technically possible but so unlikely to succeed that felling with compensatory plantation is the more honest recommendation.

It should not be. The receiving site governs whether the move is worth attempting at all: its soil, drainage, space, water and tenure. A feasibility report that recommends transplantation without naming and assessing a receiving location has left out the part that most often decides the outcome.

No. It assesses probability against known factors and identifies the conditions on which survival depends: preparation, season, root-ball size, aftercare. Any guarantee of survival for a mature tree move should be treated with caution; what can be committed to is method, preparation and aftercare.

The census is the factual inventory: number, species, girth, condition, position. Feasibility is the judgement layer on top of it. Enumeration comes first, feasibility follows, and the two together form the technical basis of the application to the Tree Authority.