First visit of 2025 after the snow and very cold weather. It’s amazing what the weight of snow can do, flattening the bramble and ground cover but also breaking things that are a little fragile. One wall of my composting toilet has collapsed. I might have to rebuild completely at some point.

I didn’t have anything major planned for the day, just to hang out, have a fire, bring some logs back home and rejuvenate my spirit. Another unexpected death in the family and a funeral has battered me a bit. I feel good when at the woods and I really like this time of year there. With no leaves on the trees, you can see the true shape of them and gain a better perspective of where everything is in relation to each other.

I cut up the tree I had felled by hand last time and carried the large pieces back to my work area for further cutting and chopping another time. Some of it looks very nice inside and hopefully I can make a small bowl with some of it eventually. I have a lot of projects in mind but don’t seem to be able get around to doing any of them. This year I need to up my game and get back into some woodland activities.

I love this gnarly old hawthorn.

Walking around the hazel coppice area I was really pleased with the way some of them have grown nice straight rods. They are about ready for coppicing again but I doubt I can get around to it this winter.

A few years ago a friend gave me some hazel trees that had been part of a garden hedge. The roots were a bit sparse but I planted them in various parts of the wood and cut them back hoping they would take. They all did and some remarkably well. This one had grown four stout branches and lots of tiny “sun shoots.” I decided it was about right now, to coppice the big ones, to encourage more new rods to grow which will soon catch up with the others. It has the makings of a very nice tree in a few more years.

Not much else to tell so will leave you with a few more photos of this beautiful place. This is probably my biggest and oldest tree, an oak about 120 years old.

Dead birch tree with Razor Strop fungi – Fomitopsis Betulina or Birch Polypore

The stump of another dead birch with four or five different fungi species growing on it now.