Woodland Trust PAWS visit

Thanks to Tim Hodge and his colleagues at the Woodland Trust for organising a two day workshop in Wales. Carol Robertson & Gordon Gray Stephens from Scottish Native Woods joined a group of people who are delivering WT supported PAWS projects. We looked at the impact of gradual restoration on two sites. We also got a very interested insight into some new research that Tom Curtis has undertaken to show the impact of gradual restoration on a selection of sites from around Britain. WT will be publishing this research shortly. Here are Tom & Tim leading a discussion session



Wales has been hit by the outbreak of phytopthora in larch, so each site visit started and ended with a new forestry dance: spraying footwear to minimise the risk of transferring this worrying new problem. Richard Thompson gets a clean pair of heels.

Coed Felinrhyd is an upland site. These oak trees had been underplanted with western hemlock, and have now been released. This treatment helps to ensure that these native woodland remnants are protected and enhanced. Much of the discussion centred around what the next steps should be. There is reasonable certainty that the initial approach of securing remnant features is correct, however the importance of a site by site approach becomes even more important when deciding what to do next.

We also visited Plas Power, a lowland site, where WT have been thinning stands of exotic conifers, with the aim of manipulating light levels to encourage a native woodland ground flora and the natural regeneration on native trees. Here we discussed the efffect on "woodland specialists" of management which allowed in too much light too quickly. The new research shows that coarse vegetation has an adverse impact on these specialist species. The picture shows some natural regeneration getting away in a thinned stand.