Tuesday 20 February 2007

THE GROWING GLADE


Saturday 17th and Monday 19th February 2007

The past couple of visits have seen good progress expanding the glade’s length; it now reaches to the fence on the south side of the wood. As well as felling trees, this has also involved clearing more of the wood felled by previous owners and trimming back some young regrowth from coppice stools. One of the next jobs will be to make the glade wider, while preserving a few selected trees within it (a large birch and a couple of relatively young oaks). On a walk round the wood we clear back some young growth and brambles to give a more defined, easier to follow path* to the east of the wood, we’ve also cleared a path* from the entrance to the glade. We set up a cheap tarpaulin (from eBay) to provide a dry store for the firewood as it seasons. As well as helping with the glade, Granddad clears some old dead coppice stools and has made us some bird-boxes turned from some of the chestnut that we’ve felled. We see a squirrel, 2 red admirals and a pheasant (there are a lot of pheasants along the local lanes). The bluebells are pushing up green shoots all over so we are looking forward to a colourful spring show.


* well, we say path, it’s really just a route that avoids getting snagged on branches and brambles.

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