An Idiot's guide to Ancient Woodland management

[Bolt]

4 hours ago, sandspider said:

 

Good to see you back.

 

What's the little black tractor in the first pic? I like the looks of that.

 

 

[Treemover]

How do you like the farma trailer is it the 6 ton?

[the village idiot]

21 hours ago, Treemover said:

How do you like the farma trailer is it the 6 ton?

Hi Treemover,

 

Yes, it is the 6 ton. It has been a really good little trailer for us. I bought it second hand towards the end of last year and then the big yellow forwarder (converted articulated dumper pictured on the previous page) seduced me. (I am a complete sucker for weird vehicles).

 

My thinking was that I would sell on the Farma but have since changed my mind. It does a really good job and we run it behind my little Valmet, alongside the big yellow Hydrema, making the most of dry ground windows with two forwarding machines.

 

We reckon we have managed to get 5 ton on it with the bunk extended and the 'greedy bolsters' in. It won't lift massive logs but the crane is actually more capable than I thought it would be. 

 

Here's Steve looking particularly chuffed with a good load of Ash. I think he used the excavator to load the trailer on this occasion but the crane would have been fine with all the logs pictured, many of them two at a time.

 

 

The levers are located on a pole attached to the drawbar. This obviously means you have to exit the tractor to load and unload the trailer, but we have found this can be a bit of a blessing on hot summer forwarding days. We could mount the controls on the back of the tractor but we haven't got a reversible seat.

[the village idiot]

On 08/05/2023 at 16:01, Stere said:

How  much each do you sell the hazel rod bundles for?

 

 

 

 

Hi Stere,

 

Apologies for the appallingly slow reply!

 

That is a load of hedge laying binders as you probably know. We also produce stakes. I sell them for £1 per item. They are in bundles of 20 so £20 per bundle collected.

[AndrewS]

What a cracking read! Many thanks to TVI and all the other contributors for so generously sharing your experiences and wisdom.

 I’m hoping to soon become the proud custodian of a modest 7 acre broadleaf woodland in NE Scotland. It’s taken almost a year to get to the point of engaging solicitors to conclude the purchase and I’m trying hard not to get ahead of myself but reading this I’m like the proverbial child in a sweet shop!

[sandspider]

Don't rush in, watch it for a year or so and see what happens, what grows where etc. Enjoy!

[manco]

how much management is actually needed of an ancient woodland that we assume has been there for hundreds of years already?

isnt it just picking up the dead bits and cutting anything thats fallen hanging or is gonna fall?

 

and no i dont have a damn clue cos its totally not my area.

 

[Will C]

14 minutes ago, manco said:

how much management is actually needed of an ancient woodland that we assume has been there for hundreds of years already?

isnt it just picking up the dead bits and cutting anything thats fallen hanging or is gonna fall?

 

and no i dont have a damn clue cos its totally not my area.

 

Far from it. That approach is what is ruining our woodlands! To many people are “leaving it for the wild life” with out realising they are killing the wildlife!

 

If the hazel isn’t coppice regularly it stops producing nuts and we lose the dormice. If the thinning works stop we get a closed canopy that kills the good understory which in turn is replaced with blackthorn scrub which in all honesty is about a bleak as it gets from a ecological perspective, sure a few rodents etc will live in it but the wood will lose all the song birds, dormice adders etc. this is before we start on the botanical gems you find in a healthy managed woodland.

 

Before man had tools the Woolley mammoth and bision would have flattened a few trees and made glades but now the whole eco system has evolved around man made management, the best thing we can do is continue this and at the same time produce our own wooden products in turn saving thousands of tons of fuel being burnt to import what we can grow!

 

sorry for the rant!

[AHPP]

 

[sime42]

5 hours ago, Will C said:

Far from it. That approach is what is ruining our woodlands! To many people are “leaving it for the wild life” with out realising they are killing the wildlife!

 

If the hazel isn’t coppice regularly it stops producing nuts and we lose the dormice. If the thinning works stop we get a closed canopy that kills the good understory which in turn is replaced with blackthorn scrub which in all honesty is about a bleak as it gets from a ecological perspective, sure a few rodents etc will live in it but the wood will lose all the song birds, dormice adders etc. this is before we start on the botanical gems you find in a healthy managed woodland.

 

Before man had tools the Woolley mammoth and bision would have flattened a few trees and made glades but now the whole eco system has evolved around man made management, the best thing we can do is continue this and at the same time produce our own wooden products in turn saving thousands of tons of fuel being burnt to import what we can grow!

 

sorry for the rant!

 

Good rant, spot on. As a note; Bison have been reintroduced somewhere in Kent. Time will tell how that pans out.

 

Wilder Blean Bison Project | Kent Wildlife Trust

WWW.KENTWILDLIFETRUST.ORG.UK

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We have introduced European bison to help restore UK wildlife and tackle the climate crisis.

 

From that article;-

"""In the UK, lack of woodland management is one of the eight biggest drivers of species decline. """