Yesterday I had intended to clear some of my brash away and continue to build my brash hedge with it and get the newly coppiced area ready for the deer fencing before the new shoots start. As I was taking my roll of netting anyway, I thought I’d do another job first which might take an hour. How wrong that was! There’s an area where dozens, maybe hundreds of ash saplings have sprouted. They’re about a foot high and doing very nicely. I’m guessing they are only a year or two old, and so far have escaped the attention of browsing deer. My plan was to fence off an area around them with the netting to protect them. They can either be a nursery to be transplanted to another spot later or left to grow as a small closely planted grove which would produce lots of tall straight thin stems which could be cut as poles, rather like coppicing. Either way I want to keep the munching deer off them. So that was going to be my first job but it took all day.

There were three small sycamore trees earmarked for felling. They were poor specimens and removing them will allow more light in to help natural regeneration of ground cover. When felling, you need to assess which way they will naturally fall due to any lean or imbalance of weight and aim to drop them roughly in that direction. They were all in danger of hitting the area to be fenced so they needed to come down first. I’m still using hand saws rather than chainsaws for these small jobs so not a quick, easy job. So once down, they needed clearing away. It’s a case of removing the small side branches from the bigger limbs (called snedding – what a great word) and cutting the limbs into more manageable sizes. So more hand-sawing needed. Some of the straight boughs could be used for the fencing posts along with some hazel previously felled. My aim is to try to use as much material already in the woods, rather than buying posts etc. Still more prep work to do. The area was infested with brambles and although quite low at the moment, they are raring to go again. So it was a case of carefully slashing them at ground level, pulling and tugging at the long leaders without damaging the saplings.

So by this time half the day was gone. A break for lunch (goats cheese and beetroot sarnies). At this point I tell myself I should have a good sit down and rest to regain my energy but you know what? – it’s impossible. If I’m not working hard, then the other occupation is give myself the luxury or a leisurely walk around to see what’s new and interesting. I so lunch time lasted about 15 minutes max. I checked down all the tree guards to see how my newly planted babies were doing. Some are still asleep but many are waking up to spring and showing nice fat buds ready to burst open or already open like the hazel, birch and cherry.

The wood is really starting to look pretty now. Most areas are carpeted with a covering of green. Mostly wood anemonies, wild garlic, lords and ladies, mosses and grasses. The anemonies are particularly abundant and flowering now adding a touch of pure magic.

The rest of the day was spent hammering posts into the ground (nice and soft) and tying the netting to them. I made a circular area about 10 metres in diameter. It didn’t enclose all the saplings but would have needed to be twice the size and just not doable in the time I had. The ones outside the enclosure will have to take their chance with the deer and it will be interesting to see how they compare at the end of the year.

At one point I heard a nearby bird calling, not one I could recognise. It was incredibly loud, insistent and quite complex. I couldn’t see it but tried to record some of it on my phone. I omly managed a few seconds, not much to work on. I looked through my bird app on my phone for birds likely to be a woodland and of a reasonable size. The closest I found was a green woodpecker but at this point I can’t be sure. I have only once seen one in my life and it was very fleeting so I’d love to see one in my wood. I’ll keep you posted on that one.