Coppicing for butterfly habitat - pictures

[john k]

Here are some pictures from a job I have been working on for the South Downs National Park. It's at Henley Copse near Midhurst in West Sussex, on the Cowdray Estate.

 

We were cutting chestnut coppice to improve the habitat for the local Pearl-bordered Fritillary Colony.

 

Here are a few pictures of before we started:

[john k]

Some work in progress . . .

[john k]

A bit of cunning extraction using a 4x$ and a redirect in a handy Douglas Fir

 

The site was sloping and slippery, with a rideside ditch to negotiate. No wonder there hadn't been much recent interest in working it commercially!

[john k]

And a few pictures of us finishing off on site . . .

[David Humphries]

Neat work

 

How long?

 

 

 

.

[Christopher Schroeter]

I like that a lot! Some people have got great jobs!

[john k]

Neat work

 

How long?

 

Thanks.

 

It's been a couple of weeks in total so far, but we've been doing odd days here and there. We've got a couple more days lined up to finish tidying up and take down some edge trees that were left on the next coupe along.

 

 

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[john k]

I like that a lot! Some people have got great jobs!

 

It is great, but it's hard work. It's a deceptively difficult site, with a lot of awkward manual handling.

 

The first couple of days were pretty demoralising as it didn't feel like we were making any real progress. Once you start breaking through to the edges though you can suddenly see a massive difference.

[NI Tree]

tidy looking

[arbmark]

:trytofly:tree work-schweework man what are the butterflies?!?! Please say its white admirals i bludy loves them