Everyone enjoys the wood

One of the great pleasures of owning a wood is sharing it with other people. As the strange summer of lockdown comes to a close we can look back on a few of the visitors  who've had fun in the wood. 

Boyz in the wood

Six boys spent two nights in the cabin - a chance to catch up and chill out together far from parents and university. How they all managed to jam into the cabin we're not asking. 

They even made a video

Neighbours

These three loved it so much they're coming back to spend a couple of nights in the cabin and watch the bats. Perhaps they'll move in  and never go home ...

Climbing up every deer hide

The rope swing proved popular

Family party

Finally an end of summer family get together, under strict C19 rules - but with proper tea, delicious sandwiches  and cake.

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Tree Planting

Our ongoing tree planting project at Old Copse is a vital component of the restoration of 30 acres of ASNW, (partially PAWS), situated in an AONB, part designated SSSI.* 

In the mid 1950's almost all of the original ancient woodland was clear felled and Scots Pine planted across the site. The big storm of 1987 blew down half of the plantation, and birch and other broadleaves are now regenerating in areas where once only pines grew. Our project is to fell the majority of the remaining Scots Pine plantation, and return it to mixed woodland. We are doing this gradually and carefully and replanting in the gaps to maintain 'continuous cover'. 

As part of our management plan we started by felling approximately a third of the Scots Pine plantation in December 2015, and in late 2016 started planting a mix of broadleaves: oak, beech, wild cherry, hornbeam, chestnut and hazel, in the open areas created by the felling. The species mix has been chosen to match those occurring naturally on the site, supplemented by a few English native trees not found within the existing vegetative community, such as small-leaved limes. We aim to achieve a healthy diversity to help the wood withstand the threats of climate change. We have now planted well over 1,000 trees. Every year we fell a little more and replant in the gaps. 

Replanting in the gaps in the plantation

Three years on some of the hornbeams are more than 7ft tall 

Foreground - new planting and remaining Scots Pines, background - remnant original woodland

Oak emerging from tree shelter 

We have planted more than 1000 trees. Note also regenerating ground flora encouraged by the removal of bracken.

Replanting is augmented by a great deal of natural regeneration prompted by the felling, predominantly oak, beech, rowan, alder buckthorn and goat willow. All promising regeneration has to be protected from deer predation. We also transplant any regeneration growing in the 'wrong place' such as the middle of the rides, and grow them on in our deer proof tree enclosure before planting them out elsewhere in the wood. 

Protecting regenerating beech with recycled tree tubes

Growing on natural regeneration in our deer-proof enclosure

By implementing the continuous cover system, newly planted trees might not grow as fast as if they were planted on an open, treeless site, but we've been surprised and pleased at their good rate of growth. We've also been quite lucky with the weather over the past few years, especially the last wet winter which helped the newly planted whips settle in and make it through hot, dry summers. Losses have been minimal. We've been unable to find long lasting, biodegradable tree tubes so we use a mixture of recycled, mesh, standard plastic and home-made wire shelters.   

The future: To continue what we've been doing since late 2016, aiming to fell a further 20% or so of Scots Pine in the next few years, replant, and repeat until the majority of the Scots Pine have been replaced by broadleaves. It is very encouraging to see the difference in the woodland since the felling and replanting began just 3 1/2 years ago. Lastly, because restoring a wood costs money, a further bonus of the felling operations is that the sale of timber for both chip and sawlogs has helped finance other projects in the wood, including the planting of over half a mile of boundary hedge.  

* 

ASNW - Ancient Semi-Natural Woodland

PAWS - Plantation on an Ancient Woodland Site

AONB - Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty

SSSI - Site of Special Scientific Interest 

Teapod Party in the wood

Our friend Therese has left the world of digital tech for a new career making crepes and milkshakes at festivals and parties.  Last Saturday was a perfect day for a small, relaxed woodland gathering - socially distanced of course (we tried). The weather was gorgeous and the wood the perfect setting. So what better place for Therese to take her new venture for a trial run?  Friends agreed to come and sample some crepes and it was George's 9th birthday too ..

Therese, and George the Birthday Boy

George and  Pippa  waiting for a  treat.

 

Fire

Wisps of smoke show where the fire is burning underground

The phrase 'Stupid is as Stupid Does' has been in common use during this Covid 19 pandemic to describe people who behave in carelessly stupid ways, putting themselves and others in danger. I think the phrase is also relevant when applied to a recent incident at Old Copse. 

Each time we go to Old Copse we do a recce to make sure that everything is ok, for example, checking for fallen trees and large branches in windy weather. This morning, with a busy work day planned as usual, I  took a quick walk about. There was a strong smell of woodsmoke and lots of smoke around. I  quickly found its source and was shocked and alarmed to find that a fire was burning through the leaf litter and had evidently been going for some days despite  recent rain. The burn had gone deep into the ground layer and the fire was spreading below the surface. The charred area was  20 ft across and flames were licking the edges, driven by a south west breeze.

After stamping out as much of the visibly burning areas as possible,  I ran to get help from Sarah. Thank goodness we could get water from the lake, but it was a long and exhausting process filling containers and dragging them up the bank to the burning site. We  dread to think what would have happened if  the fire had continued to burn and/or there had been no water source. We spent much of the day making as sure as we could that the fire had been contained.We can only hope that we were successful and it is not still burning at Old Copse.

Down at the pond fetching water - bucket by bucket

Fire finally out - we hope

We are baffled by the behaviour that caused this. This photo clearly show the remains of the original fire, edged by burned logs. Why anyone would use logs as a fire edging is incomprehensible .

The fire was burning hottest inside tree stumps.

What a shame that the fire was not extinguished properly. It must have been burning for a week - hence the spread of the damage. Absolutely anyone with an interest in,  respect for, and understanding of  woodlands would know about wildfires, and how destructive they can be, especially in an area where pine predominates. Pine needles, full of  highly flammable oils, build up a deep layer, and when lit,  the fire will quickly spread under the surface. By the time this fire was discovered the area of burn was already 20 feet across and still burning slowly and steadily aided by a southwest wind. Much of the burning cannot be seen because it is below the surface.

There are endless stories in the press about  forest and woodland fires caused by carelessness and ignorance - a dropped match,  cigarette end, a barbecue etc., but still it goes on, uninformed people who do not understand the dangers, just wanting to enjoy our beautiful wood  and no doubt, to have  something to post on their Instagram account. It would be no good putting up signs or explanatory notices, these would probably be ignored. We can only hope there won't be a repeat performance, and be extra vigilant for the next few months, especially during very dry,  hot spells such as we had in late June. 

Deer Stalker Workday

The stalker's Old Copse workday was later this year because of virus restrictions. Twelve stalkers turned up, plus  multiple vehicles, a digger, a winch and other assorted kit -  an impressive team with  impressive machinery to tackle the day's work.

The first task was to make a secure home for the new second hand quad bike. The previous quadbike was stolen during the early days of lockdown when few people were about. Thieves cut the gate open, drove a truck in, used an angle grinder to release the quad, loaded it onto a trailer and made their getaway leaving the gate wide open. The police said that rural crime has increased a lot during the past  months.  The southern end of Old Copse is particularly vulnerable to unwanted intruders as it's easy to simply hop over the gate, or walk through the 'squeeze gap. The best we can do is to hide things as well as we can so as not to be a target for thieves. Mark was pretty laid back about the loss, only regretting not having got around to putting a tracker on the bike,  and  forgetting to cover it with camo netting so it couldn't be seen from the road. Anyway, another quad bike was purchased and a safer parking place needed to be found.

Building a new home for the quadbike

Having scoped out a suitable spot earlier the team dug out a space in the bank and lined it with timber. The new quadbike has moved into its new home and is not visible from the road. It's covered in camo netting,  has a tracker and is firmly attached to a hefty metal pole. Though, as Mark says philosophically, if someone sees it and really wants it, they'll find a way.

The other task was to build a wood store for all the felled timber scattered about the wood and needing a weatherproof home to season properly. This involved processing it in situ before winching and dragging it up steep slopes to the car park and then  filling the new store with it. I only saw it as they were finishing  and was surprised at how impressively  BIG it is! We hope the firewood it contains doesn't suffer the same fate as the quad bike but if so, we'll try to be as philosophical as Mark. 

An amazing amount of wood

We really appreciate having the deerstalkers' help, to manage the fallow of course, which over the years has made a great difference to our restoration of the wood, but also important, to do some of the  'heavy lifting' which the two of us just wouldn't be able to manage by ourselves. As ever, many thanks to Mark, Steve and the team. 

Taking a well-earned break

5 month catch up

Well, what a five months it's been. Our last post  was in celebration of Herbie's winning performance in  woodland.co.uk's 'Woodland Best of ' competition in the Best Woodland Dog category. This was posted on October 30th 2019. The rain had started in mid October, and was to continue until mid March 2020, making it extremely difficult to get much work done at Old Copse. What a very good thing it was to have the cabin to retreat to when the drizzle became a downpour. 

Basking in the Spring Sunshine, March 2020

                                       
Our main projects for the winter months were to do a modest amount of tree planting - no more than 100, and then to concentrate on the long neglected overstood hazel coppice at the south end of Old Copse. Sussex Lund supported this project by giving us a generous grant, and we planned to finish it by Spring 2020. Far too optimistic as it turned out. We underestimated the amount of hazel pollarding and holly felling needed.Our highly skilled and loyal forester who had helped us with our various Old Copse projects for eight years, announced that he and his wife were emigrating to Canada,  and sadly couldn't help us this time. So in between downpours we've been doggedly felling pollarding and clearing, on our own. There's still a lot to do but we've now stopped for the bird nesting season . Sussex Lund don't mind that project completion will be put back a year, so we're hoping for a drier 2020/2021 work season.

Some of the overstood Hazel waiting to be pollarded and protected from the deer 

                   

On the left a hazel and holly woodpile seasoning for next winter. On the right, a pollarded hazel protected from the deer. 

   
Tree planting also took a hit from the endless rain. We just managed to get the last of the tree whips in  the ground before the end of the planting season. The tree nursery was inundated by the heavy rains and were unable to lift and despatch them until a week ago.

Everything needed for a tree planting session: spade, stakes, hammer, tree shelters, stapler and a bag of trees.

 
A few wild daffodils together with primroses, lily of the valley and wood anenome,  have started to  spring up in new places in the wood, indicating that we're doing something right as we open the canopy and clear the bracken.

Last weekend's unusually strong north winds brought down another huge beech limb, which took out  a couple of scots pines as it fell. The result is a hung up mess which will need to be sorted out at some point.

A Scots pine fell and squashed a load of holly, which saves us a bit of work.

                     

There won't be much left of this Veteran Beech if any more limbs fall off.

                     
The surface of the wood is looking surprisingly dry, which seems strange after months of constant rain. We are just hoping that five months of  rain won't be followed by six months of drought, which would not be good for the prospects of new plantings, or the fruit and vegetable enclosure if we can't be here to water it. Which brings us to the final woodland fly in the ointment: the 'virus' and its effect on people's normal, everyday movements. At present we are still travelling to the wood, but soon we might not be able to do this. So the wood will have to get along without us. This isn't such a terrible thing as Old Copse will continue on its own without our help as it always does. But we would miss it very much.

Aah,  Spring again in beautiful Old Copse.

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