tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-63094892373471624112024-02-08T04:55:37.831-08:00Save our woods and forestsPatrick Roperhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05656486045726647263noreply@blogger.comBlogger11125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6309489237347162411.post-87235856660881668622011-02-18T14:51:00.000-08:002011-02-18T15:05:47.774-08:00Woodlands or wildlands?<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-fareast-language:EN-GB">Within a mile or so of my house there are many fields that have been lost to cultivation during my lifetime.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Most of them are now semi-mature secondary woodlands with a wide range of tree and shrub species all of which have arrived of their own accord.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Why, I often wonder, is there a growing obsession with planting trees.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Why not just buy a field and let nature fill it up?<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-fareast-language:EN-GB">Associated with this thought is a concern I have that woodlands take a disproportionate amount of conservation attention.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>We also need un-treed, open wildlands – meadows and pastures, heaths and moors, fens and marshes and the boundaries between them.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>If I had a choice of home I would go for a place where woodland, grassland and wetland meet, where there is a synergy between different habitats.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Much as I love them, I would not choose to live in a woodland, ancient or modern, unless it was in a very large glade.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>I sometimes think it is a shame that the Woodland Trust did not set itself up as the Wildland Trust, thereby not constraining itself to look after woodlands alone (though, in fairness, they do look after many non-woodland acres).<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-fareast-language:EN-GB">We seem to have forgotten about the spaces in between the woods.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Hopkins & Kirby (2007) wrote that George Peterken and Oliver Rackham both point out that prior to 1940 woods were closely linked to the rest of the landscape. </span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-fareast-language:EN-GB"></span></p><blockquote><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-fareast-language:EN-GB">"Semi-natural habitats comprised a higher proportion of the landscape between the woods. Trees spread out into the surrounding countryside through hedges and areas of wood pasture. Grassland and heath came into the wood along rides and glades or at the boundaries.</span><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:115%;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman";mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi; mso-fareast-language:EN-GB"><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-fareast-language:EN-GB">During the 20th century much of the semi-natural habitat around and in between the woods was lost, particularly in the lowlands of Britain. Even where semi-natural vegetation survives between the woods its quality may have declined. Therefore, despite the increase in woodland area since 1947 changes in the nature of the landscape matrix may have affected the population dynamics of species within woods through an increase in their ecological isolation."</span></p></blockquote><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-fareast-language:EN-GB"> <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-fareast-language:EN-GB">A forest, of course, has never been an area of closed canopy trees but a wildland with many different habitats, a fact that only seems occasionally acknowledged in the current woodland and forest debate.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Robert Pogue Harrison (2007) in his book <i style="mso-bidi-font-style:normal">Forests.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>The Shadow of Civilization</i> had some thought provoking ideas that seem particularly relevant in the light of the recently abandoned sell-off proposals:<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"></p><blockquote><p class="MsoNormal">“... who can put his impress on the forest?<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Who can impose a human or political will upon the will of nature?<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Who can force the forest into one’s service?<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>....<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Humankind is always “impressing” the forest in one way or another, stripping it, conquering it, cultivating it, conscripting it.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Likewise the forest is always impressing those who lose their way in its labyrinth.” (Mrs Spelman please note).</p> <p class="MsoNormal">“One of the ways in which this dream of mastery and possession becomes reality in the post-Christian era is through the rise of forest management during the late-eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Forests become the object of a new science of forestry, with the State assuming the role of Descartes’s thinking subject.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Predictably enough, modern forestry reduces forests to their most literal of “objective” status: timber.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>A new “forest mathematics” goes so far as to measure them in terms of their volume of disposable wood.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Method thus conspires with the laws of economy to reappropriate forests under the general concept of “utility”, even in those cases where utility is conceived in aesthetic terms: forests as recreational parks, for example, or as “museums” of original nature.”</p> <p class="MsoNormal">“Recently we have come to learn a great deal about the ecology of forests.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>....<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Given our increased knowledge of the many interdependencies that constitute such ecosystems, forests have come to assume a powerful symbolic status in the cultural imagination to the degree that they provide a compelling paradigm for the notion of the earth as a single, complex, integrated ecosystem.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Ecological concern over forests goes beyond just the forests insofar as forests have now become metonymies for the earth as a whole.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>What is true for a particular forest’s ecosystem is true for the totality of the biosphere.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Humanity begins to appear in a new light: as a species caught in the delicate and diverse web of a forestlike planetary environment.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>More precisely, we are beginning to appear to ourselves as a species of parasite which threatens to destroy the hosting organism as a whole.”</p></blockquote><p class="MsoNormal"></p> <p class="MsoNormal">There is also a general misconception that all woods and forests need to be 'managed'. There are, in fact, many woodlands in England that now have minimum intervention or non-intervention policies and, of course, they are likely to remain wooded for the foreseeable future. Management, it seems to me, is largely to do with the production of wood/timber and sometimes to conserve species that need conditions that were once widespread in the countryside. But generally, woodland will look after itself as it did under the very different conditions prevailing before our own species arrived on these islands.</p><p class="MsoNormal">REFERENCES</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight:normal">Harrison, Robert Pogue </b>(1992)<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal">Forests.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>The Shadow of Civilization.</i> University of Chicago Press, Chicago & London.</p> <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight:normal"><span style="font-size:11.0pt; line-height:115%;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:Calibri;mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-latin;mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman";mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi; mso-ansi-language:EN-GB;mso-fareast-language:EN-US;mso-bidi-language:AR-SA">Hopkins, J. J. & Kirby, K. J.</span></b><span style="font-size:11.0pt;line-height: 115%;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:Calibri;mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-latin;mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman";mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi; mso-ansi-language:EN-GB;mso-fareast-language:EN-US;mso-bidi-language:AR-SA"> (2007)<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span></span><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;line-height:115%;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif"; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin;mso-fareast-font-family:Calibri;mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;mso-bidi-font-family:Helvetica-Black; mso-ansi-language:EN-GB;mso-fareast-language:EN-GB;mso-bidi-language:AR-SA; mso-bidi-font-weight:bold">Ecological change in British broadleaved woodland since 1947.</span></i><span style="font-size:11.0pt;line-height:115%;font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif";mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin;mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri;mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-latin;mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:Helvetica-Black;mso-ansi-language:EN-GB;mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;mso-bidi-language:AR-SA;mso-bidi-font-weight:bold"><span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Natural England, Peterborough</span>Patrick Roperhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05656486045726647263noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6309489237347162411.post-6626940692602564492011-02-18T14:07:00.000-08:002011-02-18T14:08:51.741-08:00Post U-tern future<p class="MsoPlainText">Some thoughtful material on the future of woods and forests from John Vidal in The Guardian:<o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoPlainText"><o:p> </o:p>'England's forests are not quite out of the woods yet': <a href="http://goo.gl/pmxmE">http://goo.gl/pmxmE</a></p><p class="MsoPlainText"><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoPlainText">Also an interesting new Woodland Trust website here which enables you to locate any woods with public access within a radius of where you live or work: <a href="http://goo.gl/W7PqW">http://goo.gl/W7PqW</a></p><p class="MsoPlainText"><o:p></o:p></p>Patrick Roperhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05656486045726647263noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6309489237347162411.post-12430912344404251632011-02-14T12:48:00.000-08:002011-02-14T12:49:02.773-08:00Woods, forests & Open Spaces Society<p class="MsoPlainText">The Open Spaces Society have come out very solidly against the proposed sell-off of our woods and forests. </p> <p class="MsoPlainText">Kate Ashbrook, their general secretary, says, among other things: "We have said that we are opposed to any sale of public forests and woods unless the prospective purchaser has signed an agreement, legally-binding in perpetuity, to protect the woodland; maintain and create new rights for walkers, riders and cyclists; convert any pre-existing permissive access into legal access, and welcome informal access, free of charge, at all times.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>We have no evidence that the government intends to insist on these requirements." </p> <p class="MsoPlainText">See here: goo.gl/Nr0JR</p>Patrick Roperhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05656486045726647263noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6309489237347162411.post-9953890932841998012011-02-14T06:44:00.000-08:002011-02-14T06:45:51.948-08:00A Scottish view<p class="MsoPlainText">Today The Herald, Scotland have come out with an article in favour of the proposed forest and woodland sell-off.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>I have said I would give links to the pro as well as the anti, so here it is (you have to register to read all of it): </p> <p class="MsoPlainText"><a href="http://www.heraldscotland.com/comment/guest-commentary/selling-forests-is-branching-out-in-the-right-direction-1.1084932">http://www.heraldscotland.com/comment/guest-commentary/selling-forests-is-branching-out-in-the-right-direction-1.1084932</a> </p> <p class="MsoPlainText">One interesting comment is that "in 90 years of existence, the Forestry Commissions have never made a profit, despite being the single largest suppliers of timber in the UK. If you take into account the capital costs as well as the cashflow, public forests lose between £200m and £250m annually. Whereas if they were all sold off at market rates, they could bring in almost £5 billion, which is the total reduction in debt interest payments over the course of the spending review, or the saving made by raising the pension age to 66."</p><p class="MsoPlainText"><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoPlainText">That makes me wonder why any private individual would want to buy them other than to own a personal fiefdom.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>If it is true it also makes me wonder why many of the FC properties that we know and love are described as 'small commercial woodlands'.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>The 'commercial' bit would seem to be a misnomer, but I am sure potential buyers would not be fooled into thinking they had invested in a money spinner.</p><p class="MsoPlainText"><o:p></o:p></p>Patrick Roperhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05656486045726647263noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6309489237347162411.post-74819123312501738942011-02-13T04:34:00.000-08:002011-02-13T04:47:20.882-08:00Bid for the woods?<p class="MsoPlainText">Watching a TV debate about The Big Society this morning I wandered off into what mathematicians call a 'thought experiment'.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span> </p> <p class="MsoPlainText">In my area Rother Guardians is a well-established group of volunteers with a good track record on the Rother Woods project dealing with the conservation of butterflies and moths in the Rother and Brede Valleys of East Sussex.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Supposing this group wrote to Defra and said it was willing to manage the Forestry Commission's woods within the Rother Woods area on a voluntary basis.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>I know this would raise all sorts of probably insoluble issues, but it would be interesting to see what the Government's response was.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Apparently they are enthusiastic to encourage this kind of initiative and it is conceivable, but unlikely, that they would be keen to help the group from thought experiment to reality. </p> <p class="MsoPlainText">If groups like this don't come forward, I suspect there will be very few others prepared to step up to the plate and tackle the time consuming tasks of finance, management, insurance and liaison with other bodies and so forth that would be required to do the job properly.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>However, it would be rather splendid if Rother Guardians were given enough money to<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>buy or lease the woods and employ a small team of professionals to manage them with the volunteers remaining as trustees of the enterprise. </p> <p class="MsoPlainText">Perhaps if voluntary groups ventured into these waters, without any obligation, it would be better than simply standing on the sidelines and watching the wealthy gobble up our precious woodlands.</p>Patrick Roperhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05656486045726647263noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6309489237347162411.post-47637426441979747272011-02-11T14:35:00.000-08:002011-02-11T14:39:56.852-08:00Are they weakening?The Government has put on hold the sell-off of 15 % of publicly owned forests to consult further on issues like access and biodiversity.<div><br /></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 22px; "><span class="Apple-style-span" >The announcement refers to the 15 percent of English woodland already earmarked for the sale in last October's spending review and is separate from a continuing consultation over the remaining 85 percent of public forests that are the subject of the current controversy.</span></span></div>Patrick Roperhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05656486045726647263noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6309489237347162411.post-13193769632359013222011-02-11T13:54:00.000-08:002011-02-11T14:02:09.146-08:00Only 28 days<blockquote></blockquote>Interesting article from Geoffrey Lean, environmental correspond<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, serif; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); ">ent for the Daily Telegraph</span><h1 style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; font-weight: normal; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(30, 30, 30); font-family: georgia, 'times new roman', times, serif; line-height: 1.16em; "></span><blockquote style="color: rgb(30, 30, 30); font-family: georgia, 'times new roman', times, serif; line-height: 1.16em; "><span class="Apple-style-span" >The Big Society' won't be able to pay for England's forests. And here's why.<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, serif; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); line-height: normal; "> </span></span></blockquote><blockquote style="color: rgb(30, 30, 30); font-family: georgia, 'times new roman', times, serif; line-height: 1.16em; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, serif; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); line-height: normal; font-size: large; "></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 16px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); line-height: normal; ">He highlights how impossible it will be for local groups to buy the forests and woodlands that the government proposes to sell off:</span></blockquote><blockquote style="color: rgb(30, 30, 30); font-family: georgia, 'times new roman', times, serif; line-height: 1.16em; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 16px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); line-height: normal; "><a href="http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/geoffreylean/100075280/the-big-society-wont-be-able-to-pay-for-englands-forests-and-heres-why/">http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/geoffreylean/100075280/the-big-society-wont-be-able-to-pay-for-englands-forests-and-heres-why/</a></span></blockquote></h1>Patrick Roperhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05656486045726647263noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6309489237347162411.post-37818371752980368522011-02-10T11:36:00.000-08:002011-02-10T11:40:39.212-08:00Write to the National TrustThe National Trust is inviting <span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51); line-height: 18px; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 14px; "> </span><span class="Apple-style-span"><a href="http://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/main/w-global/w-news/w-latest_news/w-news-save-our-forests.htm" style="color: rgb(31, 79, 130); line-height: 16px; text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; ">members of the public to send in their views</a> on the sell off of publicly owned woods and forests, including using Twitter and Facebook. See here:</span></span><div><span class="Apple-style-span"></span><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;"><br /></span></span><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51); line-height: 18px; "><span class="Apple-style-span"><a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-12407798">http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-12407798</a></span></span></div></div>Patrick Roperhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05656486045726647263noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6309489237347162411.post-74183691121527158802011-02-10T11:29:00.000-08:002011-02-10T11:30:46.686-08:00Sussex Wildlife Trust on new proposals<div>A very balanced commentary - well worth reading</div><div><br /></div><a href="http://www.sussexwt.org.uk/conservation/conservation/page00024.htm">http://www.sussexwt.org.uk/conservation/conservation/page00024.htm</a><div><br /></div>Patrick Roperhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05656486045726647263noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6309489237347162411.post-40964442489089949712011-02-10T11:03:00.000-08:002011-02-10T11:05:53.884-08:00A glimmer of hope<p class="MsoNormal">The Rt. Hon.John Redwood MP for Wokingham in Surrey has an online diary:</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><a href="http://www.johnredwoodsdiary.com/2011/02/09/the-big-society-and-the-state-can-only-the-state-look-after-us/">http://www.johnredwoodsdiary.com/2011/02/09/the-big-society-and-the-state-can-only-the-state-look-after-us/</a></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Yesterday, 9 February, he wrote a piece entitled “<span style="mso-bidi-font-weight:bold">The Big Society and the state: can only the state look after us?” in which, among other things, he said of ‘heritage forests’<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>that others seemed to think that </span>“apparently only the Forestry Commission can be trusted to keep the trees and allow us to walk by them.”<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>At the end of his posting he said “The government knows that if charities and other institutions do not want to take on running a heritage forest, and if the public remain opposed to its transfer, they cannot force it. The Big Society runs on the voluntary principle. The government can offer, and allow a decade to local groups and charities to see if they want to own their local wood. It is a permissive policy, not a threat.”</p> <p class="MsoNormal">I emailed Dr Redwood asking how, before the consultation, 'heritage forests' have been distinguished from 'small commercial woodlands' and that I could not see local authorities or local groups buying and managing these 'small commercial woods' (often covering hundreds of acres) without being given money to do so.</p> <p class="MsoNormal">The Forestry Commission did not, presumably, have to buy their woods and they have, of course, been given a budget to manage them.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Most, I suspect, are not ‘commercial’ and will have made little, if any, money but they are partly there, of course, to create a timber reserve should we be blockaded as we were in past wars.</p> <p class="MsoNormal">In calling for charities and local groups to step in, the government may be offering the woods and forests but not the money to run them.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Indeed, they want payment.</p> <p class="MsoNormal">Anyway, to his considerable credit The Rt. Hon John Redwood replied this morning saying “The government has said it will reconsider designations, so I suggest you write in with others and propose an upgrade.”</p> <p class="MsoNormal">Thus it is essential that we list the important ‘small commercial woodlands', in Sussex (and other areas if you are there) and together propose they are upgraded to heritage forests and woods, perhaps with some rationale accorded to each of them.</p>Patrick Roperhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05656486045726647263noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6309489237347162411.post-49797085630865590842011-02-06T10:02:00.000-08:002011-02-06T10:16:29.555-08:00Future of the public forest estateI have started this blog to add my voice, and that of friends, to condemn the appalling idea of selling off England's woods and forests. More will follow quite quickly, but first here is a quote from the Financial Times on 3 February 2011: "...over the long term there is no obvious fiscal benefit. Selling off the woods is an emotive subject and going ahead is already proving politically costly"<div><br /></div><div>Here are also some matters that do not seem to me to have been properly considered or explained:</div><div><p class="MsoPlainText">There seems to be a focus on <b>'heritage' forests</b>, but I think many small FC properties are equally important because they are near the places where people live.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>In Sedlescombe, where I live for example, it is a long way to a 'heritage' forest, but we have Battle Great Wood, Beckly Woods, Footland Wood, Barnes Wood and many others within a close radius and these give a nice selection of FC places to walk - they do not need to cover square miles of land.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span> </p> <p class="MsoPlainText"><b>Access.</b><span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>The Government says that access will be conserved.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Does this mean that new owners will be under an obligation to maintain car parks and footpaths and, in particular, any open glades or heathy areas that are so important for biodiversity? Will rides have to be maintained at an appropriate width for optimum ecological benefit?<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Will there be 'close seasons' when shooting takes place, or the birds to be shot are breeding?<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Will 'access' mean the freedom to go anywhere in the wood or forest, or will it be confined to set paths and routes? </p> <p class="MsoPlainText"><b>Identification.</b><span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>How will we know if a wood or forest has public access or not?<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Currently Forestry Commission Woods are clearly marked on the popular Ordnance Survey Explorer and Pathfinder maps.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>If these woods are sold and the Forestry Commission marking removed, how will people know which woods are accessible?<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Perhaps the Government could consider continuing to mark them on maps somehow or other.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>"Former public wood sold to a private owner by the Coalition Government in 2011." </p> <p class="MsoPlainText">If all the Ordnance Survey and other Government maps have to be changed, I wonder if the cost has been taken into account. </p> <p class="MsoPlainText">Many Forestry Commission properties have a sign at the entrance(s) so that people know there is access.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Will the new owners have to erect signs saying that the wood/forest is one of the free access ones? </p> <p class="MsoPlainText">Is there the quite interesting danger that, in the absence of any positive information, people will assume that most or all woods have access?<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>If challenged when walking, could the appropriate response be "Oh, I thought this was one of the public woods you had bought from the Government." </p> <p class="MsoPlainText">Is this a good moment to press for the 'Right to Roam' to be extended to all woods and forests? </p> <p class="MsoPlainText"><b>Shooting.</b><span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>I mentioned shooting above and, unless shooting for sport is absolutely forbidden in any sold off woods/forests, it seems likely to escalate.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Apart from the dislike of this pursuit by so many who use the countryside, it is likely to represent both a danger and a reason to deny access to woods.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Many who have been in France know the tyranny in the French countryside of 'La Chasse' and its powerful lobby. </p> <p class="MsoPlainText">There is also the question of noise.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>The countryside where I live has been relatively peaceful for the last several years, but this could change with the dismal sound of organised shotgun fire reverberating around during the shooting season.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>This unpleasant effect extends, of course, far beyond the woods and forests where it is taking place. </p> <p class="MsoPlainText"><b>Management.</b> There has been much talk of management.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>It may be possible for an experienced woodland/forest manager to be employed on the larger properties.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Most of the smaller ones are too small to justify such an expense.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Organisations like county wildlife trusts, the RSPB or the Woodland Trust have managers that cover a number, often a large number, of woodland properties spread over a wide area.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>The input of experienced people from the Forestry Commission who cover large areas will, presumably, no longer be available and the management of small woods will suffer as the new owners are unlikely to have the time or money to invest in the long learning curve and multiple skills needed to know how best to deal with a wood.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>There is also the question of continuity.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Most people who buy woods are quite old and they may be enthusiastic for 10 or 20 years and then give up managing or sell the wood.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>The FC, Natural England and NGOs usually have long term policies so that there is the essential continuity of planned management down the generations. </p> <p class="MsoPlainText"><b>Countryside stewardship.</b><span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>If the scheme continues, many of the sold off woods could be eligible for Entry Level or Higher Level Stewardship.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Among other things this means they will receive payment from the Government provided they stick to the agreed management plan.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>I wonder if the cost of this has been taken into account in considering the 'profit' from woodland/forest sales. </p> <p class="MsoPlainText"><b>Deer control.</b><span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>In many places deer, and also wild boar, are increasing.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Their control via fencing and culling are complicated operations requiring cooperation over large areas if they are to be effective.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Many of the animals are using smaller woods and increasingly coming into gardens as different, and often only partially successful, strategies are used to control them.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>If they are not controlled (and some new woodland owners might not want this) some woods may, in the long run, turn into wood pasture and, ultimately overgrazed grassland with starving animals and not much else.</p></div>Patrick Roperhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05656486045726647263noreply@blogger.com0