Tuesday 1 September 2009

August – Summers End


A chilled out time in the woods this month. Spending some of the time just sitting with the trees watching the world drift by with the clouds. Plus walking through the woods and reminding myself of what is there and how lucky I am to have this place. A new sighting in the wood this month (which I would have stepped on if it hadn’t moved at the last minute) was a grass snake sunning itself on the track. I also noticed a woodpecker hole in one of the oak standards that is now in space where the surrounding chestnut was coppiced last winter. A bit late in the season I did some work for the butterflies; cutting back the trees at the south end of the glade so that butterflies flying along the edge of the field/wood can now also fly into the glade. The bright green of summer starting to mellow, my thoughts turned to the coming winter (or ‘felling season’ as I’m starting to think of it) and where to concentrate my efforts. I’m thinking that instead of coppicing another half acre (which hopefully Silva Energy will do instead) I may spend time broadening the glade, cutting back some regrowth and maybe thinning chestnut from around the indigenous trees in the central area (leaving mainly oak, birch and the few rowan that are there).