End of forest area stripped by fire, ultimately - ash? (4)
I believe the answer is:
tree
'ash?' is the definition.
(ash is a kind of tree)
'end of forest area stripped by fire ultimately' is the wordplay.
'end of' says to take the final letters.
'stripped' means to look at the middle letters.
'by' says to put letters next to each other.
'ultimately' says to take the final letters.
The central letters of 'area' are 're'.
The last letter of 'forest' is 't'.
The last letter of 'fire' is 'e'.
't'+'re'+'e'='TREE'
(Other definitions for tree that I've seen before include "Tall wooden plant" , "Large woody plant (4)" , "eg Lime" , "eg Rowan" , "Eg, a baobab" .)