February 2017

An interesting week as January rolled into February.
The ground still a little damp underfoot, but a noticeable amount of fresh green growth in places and quite a bit of wildlife.

A couple of hosted visits...

The first was a small group of local villagers (instigated from concerns about perceptions of development).
I'd made a reasonable effort to bring some laminated cards of work scopes and conservation activities on the plot, classic habitat and woodland management guidance books, legislation details etc. that I work to, together with a tea-urn and sandwiches at a half-way point.

Unfortunately a member of the group was challenging from the start, interrupting any semblance of an introduction of myself, background, past projects and my view forward.
I was about to pack things up and go, but felt that despite most concerns being unconnected to myself, or being matters that would become self-evident, it was worth cutting the introduction and what had become an adversarial start, to moving through the site and try and move forward positively.

Within 100 metres things became more cordial and chatty by the time we got to the sandwiches.
Hopefully everyone went away with rumours quashed, genuine interest in what I do and an understanding of the balance of wildlife and productive trees on the plot.
Also, the guided walk hopefully draws a line under any local misgivings about the woodland and quashes any escalation to an unfounded rumours stage.
An extra bonus was the local village hall having an open night after refurbishment, later in the week and being able to chat informally to a couple of people who missed the chance to walk around.

Anyone is welcome to contact me to arrange a guided walk around, as well as being  able to preview the guidance notes to my Management Plan.

Work has been a little slow due to some external / home life priorities, but a few more hedging plants have gone in as replacements around the gateway.
Sourced from the excellent Maelor Forest Nursery - great to have such a professional resource on the doorstep for trees and hedging.
A little more brashing and pruning of side branches of trees, this serves two purposes as it helps form the trunk shape in later tree life, but I also use a tally counter to get a better idea of the trees on the overall site.

Another job is the slow steady coppice of some of the birch trees before the sap comes up with the onset of spring.
As the birch are mainly in a linear row around the track edges, I'm taking every 5th tree down to the stump. How the coppice regrowth performs, will give me an idea if a 5 year rotation is a bit too fast (1/5 of the 531 birch trees cut each year, then start again year 6).

Partial coppice of birch trees

The next visit was informal, a friend from the Wildlife Trust, particularly to consider Club Tail Dragonfly and habitat potential (dependent on silt characteristics in one of the ponds), or at least the trees which also fall into habitat aspects on their flight range.
Great additional dialogue regard hares, owls (and boxes to put up) and the balance between hedgerow management and the possibility of Dormice.
The latter have a good chance between rows of hazel along the west part of the footpath and brambles in the central ditch hedge. Ideas to maximise potential together with volunteers in the autumn for some hazel coppice regeneration.

Time was a bit short, but the value of an extra pair of experienced eyes can't be understated, particularly as aspects of overlap and integration with the wider landscape and other projects were discussed.

Wildlife seen and heard this week on site:-
Buzzard, Owls, Heron, Robin, Fox, Hare, Canada Goose, Mallard.