Forestry Update Sept 2024
2024 has been a busy year on the forestry side of Column Wood. This month we met the Forestry Commission who helped us with a Woodland Management Plan - to deal with all the dead and dangerous ash trees we have. These will be restocked with native broadleaf.
In addition to the tree planting below, we've also carried out the following forestry activities so far this year -
- cleared a fallen tree across a right of way path
- hedge planting to open up wildlife corridors
- cared for our saplings from the tree planting day and planted some more around the site
- cleared some windblown ash trees
- sold fire wood directly from site
- commenced a wildlife survey (using wildlife cameras and bird boxes)
Tree Planting Day
January 28th 2024 was our first community tree planting event, open to anyone from the local area who was interested. We had a great turn out, with approximately 50 adults and children from surrounding villages.
The trees were donated by Woodland Trust, and are all native fruit trees such as Rowan, Dog Rose, Crab Apple, Blackthorn and Elder.
The event was also supported by Lucy from The Eden Project, who works in bringing communities together. Lucy provided some delicious jacket potatoes for the fire, drinks, and marshmallows!
We were lucky enough to have some grant funding we could use towards tree guards and costs of preparing the land. This came from Sussex Lund, a grant programme supported by the Lund Trust and operated by the High Weald National Landscape Partnership.
Below are some photos of the wonderful day, and I'll soon write my first ever blog post on the process of setting up this event - both the struggles and the wins!