Managing my roughly 2 acre woodland

[Ollie_M]

Hi, just thought I’d start a thread on my 2 ish acre woodland, my dad inherited it along with 15 acres of grassland from our family farm - then gave me the task of looking after it 🙈 (no complaints) to provide our firewood,  and improve it for nature and game shooting. All possible in my opinion

 

2 years ago was the first time the woodland got touched other than having a pheasant pen for our game shoot (only relevance this has is that I can’t do anything until February when shooting season finishes) the majority of the wood is fairly dense hazel and ash, with two areas of very very dense mature blackthorn mixed with a bit of hazel, about 10 - 15ft tall, absolutely dead underneath. Not even squirrels were really present.

so i hit it hard and full cleared an area.

that was it for that year and left me with plenty of firewood.

come summer, the wood had the most life I’ve ever seen in it. Muntjac, roe, rabbbits, field mice, birds of prey. Oh and the squirrel population went mad.

I’m going to write more up later and find some more photos, but thought this thread might help people in the future whilst also giving me a way to keep note of what I do over the years

 

 

[Stere]

Muntjac & roe  browsing are not very good if you want the trees to regenerate well....

 

Maybe it was an old coppice with with some  standards from the one picture?

Edited 8 hours ago by Stere

[Muddy42]

Management can mean lots of things.  I think you are doing the right thing by opening up denser areas of woodland.  Maybe in the summer you can flail some of the thicker parts.

 

I'm not a total hippie, but arguably some aspects of rearing pheasants is not great for wildlife.  The birds eat all the invertebrates, the bird poo changes the nutrients in the soil, spilled grain can attracts rats and the birds themselves provide temporary autumn food for foxes and raptors that then go after something else for food in the rest of the year.

 

Maybe you could plant some natural game crops, which might stop birds wandering and keep the feed bill down?

[Stubby]

8 hours ago, Ollie_M said:

Hi, just thought I’d start a thread on my 2 ish acre woodland, my dad inherited it along with 15 acres of grassland from our family farm - then gave me the task of looking after it 🙈 (no complaints) to provide our firewood,  and improve it for nature and game shooting. All possible in my opinion

 

2 years ago was the first time the woodland got touched other than having a pheasant pen for our game shoot (only relevance this has is that I can’t do anything until February when shooting season finishes) the majority of the wood is fairly dense hazel and ash, with two areas of very very dense mature blackthorn mixed with a bit of hazel, about 10 - 15ft tall, absolutely dead underneath. Not even squirrels were really present.

so i hit it hard and full cleared an area.

that was it for that year and left me with plenty of firewood.

come summer, the wood had the most life I’ve ever seen in it. Muntjac, roe, rabbbits, field mice, birds of prey. Oh and the squirrel population went mad.

I’m going to write more up later and find some more photos, but thought this thread might help people in the future whilst also giving me a way to keep note of what I do over the years

 

 

You need to ask the village idiot . He has been doing this for a while now . @the village idiot

Edited 1 hour ago by Stubby