no. 48 Summer 2009 Offcuts the newsletter of the Oxfordshire Woodland Group —Principal field visit 2009— and woodland group annual general meeting Visit the impressive woodland at Watergate Farm nr Bainton, Bicester, courtesy of John Hunter Esq., 1.45pm for 2.00pm Tuesday 22nd September 2009 (see penultimate page for further details). have you got a new e-address? Send it to: [email protected] and help us save on postage! p19 OUDCE group visit to Paradise wood studying habitat restoration in April Contents: p2 Events listing: inside back page Contents 2 2 • Annual subs now due! p2 • Use us or lose us p5 • European Protected Species: seminar report——————————————p6 • Trees to timbers p8 • Oxfordshire Woodland Project: Digest of activities p9 • Project Accounts 2008/9 ———————————————————————————————————p10 • Oxfordshire Woodland Group,Trustees & Annual Report p11 • Grants update: some good news p12 • myForest: the tool for our times ————————————————————————————-p13 • No arm in it p15 • Coppice marketing in Oxfordshire p18 • We need your email——————————————————————————————————————————p19 • Project offices relocation p19 • Crocodile Eyes p20 • Events listing winter/spring 2009/2010 p23 • Become a member of Oxfordshire Woodland Group p24 • Summary of accounts and annual report p25 Pruning in Wild Cherry provenance trials. Paradise Wood Lt Wittenham Annual subs now due Membership of the Oxfordshire Woodland group is now due, so please send in your contributions to this office. The minimum charge is just £10, and should be made payable to the Oxfordshire Wood- land Group and sent to David Rees or Eric Dougliss at Oxfordshire Woodland Project Fletchers House, Park Street, Woodstock, Oxford- shire OX20 1SN We can normally receive your tax back from the government on do- nations net of the £10 subscription, if this applies to you please do return the gift aid form, opposite, with your payment. Thank You! 3 Oxfordshire Woodland Group Gift Aid Declaration I (name in capitals) ……………………………………………………………. Of (full address in capitals)………………………………………… ……………………………………………………………………… ……………………………………………………………………… have made a gift of £…… . to the Oxfordshire Woodland Group, registered charity 1055228. I confirm that I have paid sufficient tax in the UK for the charity to claim back tax against my gift. Signed…………………………………… Date…………………. Registered Charity no. 1055228 Please complete this form and return to us at Oxfordshire Woodland Project OX20 1SN 4 Late winter scene at Besselsleigh Demonstration Wood, north of Abingdon. Timber has been cut into cordwood and stacked in low, safe piles to season. Cordwood should be stacked on bearers to keep it off the ground, not discernable here. This particular supply of timber has since been split into ‘quarter staves’. It will later be extracted from the wood and then crosscut into firewood blocks stored under cover ready for winter use. Splitting twice into quarters increases the drying surface area by half as much again for a medium-sized block. Smaller blocks tend to burn more efficiently in the stove. Use us or lose us! 5 The relevance of the Oxfordshire Woodland Project grows with the recognition of climate change but so do new threats to its survival. David Rees writes... A lot has changed over the past year. All of a sudden, the sustainability message is na- tional news and all the talk is about sustainable fuels. Woodlands sequester carbon from the atmosphere and so are environmentally benign sources of fuel and also (we often forget) building materials. Woodland owners feel the environmental benefits pulling from one end and escalating heating costs pushing at the other. The woodland Project is well positioned to service these needs. The banking disaster is the other big news item. It has badly affected public life right across the globe and the Woodland Project has not been immune. At our grass-roots level, the Project has been damaged by events. Our best shield to further damage is our ongoing performance. So please help me to keep the Project’s service alive by using us to improve your woodland, your new use of firewood or your sustainable use of building timber. I continue to provide a free advisory service and can provide detailed manage- ment services at an agreed cost, often using Radley poplar harvested at 20 years grant aid negotiated on your behalf. I am available to frame up options for improving your use of your existing or potential woodland resource as part of the advisory service. The Project has an impressive list of works in action right across Oxfordshire and I am in a position to be able to take you onto a variety of sites to illustrate the effects of specific courses of action. This is an extension of the Woodland Group’s field visits and forest skills workshops that have proven their worth over 10 years and more. Lets not lose the Project just when we need it most, so… Use Us or Lose Us! Wendy & Andrew Wilson now grow firewood European Protected Species update: 6 pointers for woodland managers Alistair Yeomans* writes... The Oxfordshire Woodland Group hosted an insightful and well attended meeting on 26th February detailing the 2007 amendments to the 1994 European Habitats Regula- tions. The changes present a number of potential implications to woodland manage- ment due to the increase in legal protection for European Protected Species (EPS). Presenters covered the ecological, management and legal factors regarding EPS that woodland owners and managers are required to consider and comply with when working in woodlands. In 2007 the level of protection for EPS was increased to en- sure compliance with the EU Habitats Directive, as set out to the UK Government following a judgement in the European Court of Justice (ECJ). The updated regulations, detailed on the Forestry Commission website (see resources below), now include as an offence any damage or destruction of a breeding site or resting place. Previ- ously if damage was ‘an incidental result of a lawful operation', and reasonable precautions had been taken to avoid it, it would not have been an offence. Therefore there is a risk of woodland operators committing an offence if they have not carried out planned operations carefully, with the necessary checks and sought a licence where required. The European Protected Species currently covered by the regulations that are likely to be found in woodlands are: Bats (all 17 species) Great crested newt Dormouse Sand lizard Otter Smooth snake Situations where a licence is required to carry out forestry operations on sites with EPS can be established through an easy to use checklist produced by the Forestry Commission (see Resources below) in the form of a Yes / No flowchart to assist man- agers with the decision making process regarding forestry operations. The flow chart considers the following points: • The location of the woodland in relation to the mapped habitat ranges of EPS. • Provides details of the sources of information that you can access to find out the likely presence of EPS in your woodland’s locality. 7 • Details woodland characteristics that may indicate the presence of EPS, such as ponds which might be occupied by Great Crested Newts. • Actual evidence or signs of species activity such as otter spraint, nuts gnawed by dormice or leaves folded by newts. The flow chart follows on to provide straight forward guidance on following Good Practise guides and ultimately whether or not a licence is required. The flow chart is on a one side of A4 paper, easy to follow and is set out to minimise the paperwork associated with woodland management planning. Bechsteins Bat Steve Hunt, the National Regulations Manager for the Forestry Commission, reassured the audience by stating that 90% of the time, when FC Good Practice guides are followed, it is business as usual regarding forestry operations and that there had been only one licence application in England to date. Rebecca Isted, Forestry Commission Biodiversity Advisor for England, gave an overview of the resources available for Good Practice for each species. She detailed the available resources (listed below) to support the forestry sector to work within the law regarding habitat regulations and provided practical recommendations, such as avoiding using a chipper under the canopy of a veteran tree, or adopting a rota- tional approach to ride management to ensure continued habitat provision. It is clear that amendments to the European Habitats Regulations have caused a degree of consternation amongst the forestry sector particularly as there is potential for prosecu- tion if EPS regulations are ignored. The most salient point for woodland managers was that it is essential to be able to clearly demonstrate that, as part of the woodland man- agement planning process, European Protected Species have been sufficiently consid- ered and that operations carried out have complied with necessary provisions for EPS. The following resources provide useful links to support the planning of forestry opera- tions regarding EPS. If a woodland manager has any questions or doubts regarding EPS regulations then communicating with your local Forestry Commission woodland officer will provide the necessary support. Resources: Full details of EPS Good Practice guidance, legal requirements and downloadable checklists can be found on the Forestry Commission website - http://www.forestry.gov.uk/england-protectedspecies *Alistair Yeomans is Director of Forestry for the Sylva Foundation: www.Sylva.org.uk Trees to Timbers 8 Ken Hume, Trustee to the OWG writes… The Oxfordshire Buildings Record and The Oxfordshire Woodland Group are currently in the process of examining old timber framed houses, barns and mills in Oxfordshire to establish both the historic building practices and materials em- ployed in their construction. Most people believe that old timber framed houses were built using only oak but following our initial study of buildings in the south east of the county early results indicate that other timbers were also employed including elm, hazel & black poplar and some softwoods.