Amarus

Grass will absolutely kill your trees via root competition for water. Plus voles will nest/find cover in it if thick (assuming no further grazing/cutting due to the trees) and eat your trees. 2000 trees should take about half a day or less for an experienced operator using a bog standard 15l knapsack, provided the trees are not miles away from each other. You don't want anything heavier on your back and there is no need for any convoluted contraptions or mechanical means as the trees are in shelters. Spray a circle around the base of the trees, make sure it is about a 1m across (0.5m radius) I suggest using Kerb Flo against the grass, it is a residual herbicide & doesn't affect anything else, even if you overspray the trees (no chance of that in the shelters anyway). Must be used in December and January, needs frost for activation. Light rain is helpful, don't spray when frozen or during heavy rain. Read the label, as usual. If the winter is as mild in your area as in mine, and or there are other things than grass are present you want to combine Kerb Flo with glyphosate even in the winter. This is all you need for the first season. If you did the Kerb right (you should end up with a bare patch of earth) and have nothing else growing on the field, you might not need to spray until the year after next. Docks and other nasties will conqueror the bare patch afterwards (or grass occasionally); as and when this happens go back with glyphosate April/May time each year. If you have strong bramble, you can use Grazon. Did I say always read the label and follow all relevant legislation, use of PPE and all that? Or pay someone to do it for you, if they know what are they doing should be done before lunchtime. Should be one man day plus some chemicals.

What exactly have you been provided in writing and by whom? Whilst county highway departments have some statutory powers/exemptions you need to be absolutely certain you are covered by one of these too if you are going to fell the trees. "Someone said" is not exactly that. Once you have the letter/report then you know where to start. Just watch out for the small print as most highway reports explicitly exclude trees under 15cm dbh. Might not be a problem for you with only 15 trees but these smaller trees could quickly exceed the 5m3/calendar quarter allowance in a woodland. Your biggest concern should be, however, the timescale given to you. I suggest reading the felling regs exemptions here especially 2.5 which states: "The danger exception could be said to apply only where there is an immediate risk of serious harm and urgent work is needed to remove the risk." 4 months is not an immediate risk based on my limited understanding of the relevant arb terminology. I have been repeatedly told by the FC (cannot find online guidance, sadly) that in their world immediate means remedial action is required in less than 3 months (exclusive) i.e. measured in days and must be supported by either a qualified arborist report and/or very clear photos of showing the danger. In any other cases (3 months or over) there is enough time to get a licence. I would also refer to the ash guidance by the FC offering more details under point 4.4. (especially the last sentence under this point:) ON 46a

How long is a piece of string? There is not a simple/single answer to your question as there are way too many variables. My only piece of advice, after dealing with an enormous number of woodland owners who went ahead and bought a piece of woodland or planting land shelling out from tens of thousands to hundreds of thousands pounds only to have a very rude awakening when reality hit them in the face (and more importantly in their wallet): Do spend a grand or two on a proper, independent woodland appraisal conducted by a professional who hasn't got a skin in the game and wants to sell you something (besides some of their time)! Do this before you part with any other monies or sign anything - don't get too excited before you read and understood it. The non-forestry estate agents have not got a clue what they are selling, none of the conveyancers will have the faintest either. Go to the forestry agents and ask them for a recommendation instead. The likes of woodlands.co.uk have some interesting moral codes, my latest is a lotted conifer block somewhere in the SW sold as Douglas fir (seen all their paperwork!) which was in fact larch, not 15 miles from an active SPHN; strangely not a word on this anywhere... If you are willing to invest a lot of money and time in a piece of land you better make sure you fully understand what are you getting into first, especially if you are new to it; spending a little money upfront will truly pay dividends.

I know of a young chap (15-16 yrs of age) who is looking for work experience (perhaps even apprenticeship, if it all works out) near Aberystwyth. He is very keen on the outdoors and chainsaws in particular & he is on some sort of spectrum/ mildly neurodivergent as they call it nowadays I am based miles away in the SW but I wonder if anyone here could help. Many thanks.

Anywhere between 30p to £1.5/tree depending on site conditions, planting design and protection installed (i.e. 30p for neat conifer and £1.5 is installing 1.8m tree shelters on top of planting). Mulch mats are a waste of time and material to be honest, not to mention the impact on maintenance. Don't bother. Labour cost is probably around 70p-£1 depending on material, number of pegs etc.

If it is reasonable quality and quantity you could try John Jenkins at David James. Link to last year's auction: Just a moment... WWW.CHARTEREDSURVEYORS.DAVID-JAMES.CO.UK He could do with some support, to be honest.

This suspiciously sounds like the piece of land next to our office somewhere in Devon! My guess, if the FC does decide on a prosecution and slaps a restock notice on the entire area felled then your acquaintance could make a case to plant an alternative area at least equal to red line boundary of the new development within the same county. As the whole area is under an acre, EIA rules most likely would not be triggered. Some details on restocking notices are here: Appeal against a restocking and enforcement notice - GOV.UK WWW.GOV.UK Some further reading on recent case law: Restocking Notices under the Forestry Act 1967 and their relationship with the planning regime - No5 Barristers' Chambers WWW.NO5.COM R(Smar Holdings Limited) v Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs [2024] EWHC 2034 (Admin) Key take-aways: It is lawful to impose a requirement on a tree... I don't think the presence of a restocking notice would be game stopper for a planning permission but the cost of expert advice on how to navigate these waters might be substantial. Your best bet is calling the local WO for an honest chat. Most of these people actually try to help, if they can, particularly when they are being approached proactively rather than after the event. The fly in the ointment is, however, the most likely overzealous application of the new BNG rules. Even if the FC says we aren't bothered the council bods might take a very different view: The site was green up until very recently, trees are now gone, suspiciously right before the planning application went in therefore we assume it was the most valuable woodland that ever existed, go and compensate.

We are running two Heta Inspires 45 and 55 and cannot fault them. The larger one is on every day between October and April and apart from one door rope replacement there were no problems at all in the last 5 years. They do push out some proper heat, very simple to use (multifuel, if that matters) and in my view, look neat and clean. HETA Inspire 55 / 55H | The largest wood burning stove in the Inspire series HETA.DK Inspire 55 is the largest wood burning stove in the Inspire range. The panoramic view of the flames and the delicious materials make it suitable for both classical and modern decor. Beforehand, we had a Morso Badger, can't go wrong with that one either; it does look a tad bit more traditional but could come with some styling options.

I would definitely go for a felling licence, it covers you if someone makes a noise about your tree felling. I gather you are in Wales, felling licences tend to last for 2 years only while thinning licences are valid up to 5 years. If the land is in England, on top of a standalone licence (valid for five years) you can either create a small woodland management plan (attracting no funding) or apply for a woodland management plan (WMP) grant as the threshold has been lowered to 0.5ha (albeit RPA has not yet cottoned onto this last time I checked). A (small)WMP comes with a 10 year licence and opens up the door for some further grants.

Yes, I am, and most of the industry are saying hand felling of ash should be the absolute last resort and not the default approach. See any of guidance from FISA, FCA & Arb Association. While HSE does not provide statistic in relation to accidents caused by ash specifically there has been a marked increase in fatalities in the last 5-8 years where ash played a part. I am sure this could be proven (or disproven) if one would have the time to dig through these reports. Coupled by the fact around 80% of RIDDOR accidents happen within 2m of the tree being worked on due to the shower of branches as the others already pointed it out. Before anyone claims they are happy to fell ash that seems to have a healthy crown, the Austrians did several (somewhere over 100) pulling tests on their ash trees around 8-10 years ago having been blessed with dieback for quite some time (certainly longer than the UK at that point) and concluded that there is no correlation between tree/stem/fibre stability and crown retention. Everybody is free to choose their own way of dealing with this; under my watch there is not going to be a chainsaw anywhere near an ash tree unless there is no other way.

Without knowing which part of the country you are in, it is hard to answer. In the SW I would say around the £50/t mark is about right for the top end as the others say but a lot depends on site conditions and tree sizes etc. If it is not as straightforward and/or a small area with lot of constraints etc., you might not get much more than £20-25/t or even less. The thing that concerns me is the no harvester element, effectively the owners ask the cutters to risk their lives for what exactly? I would not entertain looking at ash trees without mechanised felling and rather walk, to be honest. Ash trees do kill people.

Robina spreads mainly through suckering from the roots and extremely rarely from seeds. Sowing pieces of roots or destumping and ripping the existing roots with a subsoiler are practised by commercial Robinia growers on the continent. If you feel adventurous, you could try shaking up the roots around the stem to see what comes up to bolster your hedge.

Let's not even go there regarding the FC's current crop of new officers. All I would say, back in the days there used to be one officer across most of Wiltshire, most of Somerset and South Glos. Nowadays, there are at least 6, one or two positions being always vacant. Level of service is not 6x better... They are suffering from the paying peanuts and getting monkeys symptom. It is not the poor officers making, I blame the people who put them in there. Enough of this, actually when you get to know them most are very pleasant to work with as long as you know their limitations. If you have not come across, this might offer you some help with roading: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/5b3611b1e5274a0bbef01fb2/ON025-ForestRoadsandTracksv1.0issued110809__1_.pdf You have not been told the right thing about the WMP - it is a working document and you are expected to change it. The only thing that is cumbersome (not impossible) to alter is the licences, the text bit is flexible (within UKFS), you can change it any time and send it over to the WO. I wouldn't worry about your plan not being valid anymore. You don't need a new licence, you want to change one of the restock conditions which can be done via email exchange. Th FC can stack licences (multiple, different licences on the same plot of land) just don't like doing it. Mainly because 9 out of 10 of them have not got clue what they should do with it. Track down your woodland officer here: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/66339adf4d8bb7378fb6c16f/1203_WO_boundaries_index_map_England_V2.39.pdf You can then work out their email as [email protected]. (N.B. don't use shortened names i.e. Rob is always going to be Robert.) Appalling, if you ask me.

Paul, Your first call should be to your woodland officer. Some variations regarding restock species are allowed in like for like situation i.e. one broadleaved tree species for another. If you have already felled the area then it might get stickier as an enacted licence cannot be changed. Depending on what the WO says, you probably only need to change the management plan wording and don't need a new licence. Potentially, CBW and natural regen can be married on the same site as the former is planted in a very wide grid allowing space for the latter. As for the track, to put it bluntly, you only have permission to build what you have included in your application to the council and nothing else. You can either ask for a variation (I have not done it for a woodland application but for my residential PP it was about £25) or submit a new permitted development notification (£180?) for what you want to do now. You have to send a prior notification to the council about the development you believe falls under the forestry exemption and if the council doesn't tell you otherwise within 28 days then you are good to go. It shouldn't be an onerous job but it really depends on the planning officer.

As usual, a load of crap from both sides of the fence. It is clear, the writer has an agenda and nothing else matters and the planting didn't go as planned either but calling a less than a year old planting a failure is a bit premature. Judge it in year five, perhaps. The comments are very typical of armchair experts touting a load of rubbish.