Tree Planting at Wimpole (Part 1)

There is currently an ongoing tree planting plan on the Wimpole estate to put back the avenues and former trees that would have been seen in the 18^th Century. I can’t remember who’s landscape plan we are referring back to; might be Bridgeman or Brown (Yes, THE Capability Brown!). Certainly over a long-term plan of 5 – 10 years, the landscape at Wimpole will be a fuller place.

If you’re interested in learning about the tree histories on the estate check out the sister blog at: https://sadeik.wordpress.com/blog/wildlife/trees.

The tree planting plan itself is thanks to the hard work undertaken by Mark who worked on the estate between 2011 and 2012, in conjunction with the conservation department in the National Trust. With the planting plan in place and approved by those higher up, we set about implementing the scheme that will run for the years to come.

So as not to have a big impact on the landscape in a short period of time and to not wear out the spades and the knees of the poor workers (i.e. us), the work has been spread out so only a hundred or so will be planted per year.

At the start of the project in 2012, we put in 60 trees in Folly field with mesh netting to protect them against foraging animals. The trees we planted were a mixture of species; Oak, Ash and Horse Chestnut to name but a few. In case you’re wondering, yes I can’t remember exactly what other species there were. There may have been Sycamore, Lime, Maple, Hazel and a few others but I’m not 100% certain we actually included those!

Incidentally the species were chosen for specifically for different locations as they would have been the original type of tree planted. Of course after we had put the 60 trees in last year, there was the Ash disease problem occurring with European imported trees so a guy from the Forestry Commission had to pay a visit to make sure the Ash trees we had just planted weren’t carriers.

Fortunately all the Ashes we had delivered were healthy and showed no signs of the disease.

View looking North(ish)

This view across the parkland to the north of the Hall was taken in 2008 and is a good representation of how the landscape currently looks. I’ll take a photo in the future to show how it looks with the new trees added. A kind of ‘then and now’ comparison.

On to 2013, and preparations for this year’s trees (all 157 of them) are being made. Last week in the snow and ice we were out and about marking the places where the trees will be planted. Bramwell, a NT conservation chap, popped along with his GPS equipment and started to plot out the locations.

While he plotted, I followed up with blue and white stakes to mark the location while Simon finished off by hammering in a solid wooden stake deep into the ground. Why mark the position of the tree twice you ask? Put it this way, have you seen the kids run amok in the countryside touching things and moving anything that isn’t welded down… yeah, that’s why! To be fair to the children (I have a nephew of my own) it’s also the mischief makers you have to watch out for.

We have different coloured poles simply because of the area the trees are going to go into. Blue for sensitive conservation locations, mainly those places where there is known, or thought to be known archaeology under the turf. White stakes are obviously the less sensitive areas out in the middle of the parkland were not much is expected to turn up. Of course there is also the possibility of digging down smack bang on top of a Roman mosaic, but that is highly unlikely judging from the archaeological landscape.

 

Wimpole Hall looking East

Speaking of archaeological landscapes, this view of the Hall looking east has some good examples of ridge and furrow seen in the foreground.

Ridge and furrow is the old medieval way of farming before the landscape at Wimpole was managed and re-designed in the 18^th Century.

The furrow was used as drainage from the main crop planted on the ridge. This was especially important with low draining soils and helped to prevent crops becoming waterlogged in particularly wet periods.

Of course in context with this post, the photo also serves as a view of the front of the Hall before we begin planting the new trees this year.

Taken in 2009, there has been no change to the landscape since then. Apart from the smaller trees nearer the Hall, which have metal tree guards round them now to prevent damage from stock.

The tree guards are in keeping with the historic landscape with a similar design from the time of Bridgeman and Brown. Same goes with the park-rail fencing seen across the estate.

 

I should also point out that the old avenues can still be seen throughout the parkland if you look close enough. There is the walnut avenue running diagonally from the front of the Hall, and the oak avenue to the north. Interestingly enough, apparently when the trees and avenues were originally planned in they are located along the grid lines seen on maps!

Since this post is all about trees and apart from the ones within the landscape on the above photos, there isn’t actually a picture of one. Here you go!

 

All of the photos are my own this time round,

Until next time…

 

January Clearance

It’s the start of the new year, but not the start of the forestry work as we have been well underway with various works for the last couple of months or so. As it’s the new year though we have started on something fresh to start it off. 

From Cobb’s Wood farm, beyond the field of horses lies a little copse of woodland where we are currently carrying out planned felling work. Well, I say little copse but it’s actually one part of the main Cobb’s Wood so not that little!

Of course the first challenge is the crossing of the horse field, which can be quite entertaining when you’re a bit clumsy like me who manages to find all the holes that jump out and then get accused of being on the whisky again! No names mentioned of course J. Usually the only two residents are Simon’s big Dutch Drafts, which are used to haul out the big loads of timber. For more information check out our companion site at https://sadeik.wordpress.com (Shameless plug #1).

Once at the far gate it’s a small trek to the working site to cut down some more trees. Before you wave your arms in horror at the prospect, it’s part of a planned scheme, I think as part of the HSL but it might be forestry commission or something like that. Either way it’s done for a reason and encourages tree regrowth as seen from previous work we’ve done in the area.

Hopefully you can see where the original cut was made and the growth of the tree around it. Ignore the buffoon on the photo as I’ve no idea where that dude came from! (For those who think I’m being rude don’t worry I know him – It’s me!)

The main problem we have with trees this young and also with the coppicing we do is that a lot of the time the shoots get grazed off by wild animals; mainly deer. This completely reduces the proper regrowth of the plants and in some cases ruins them altogether. Fortunately we are able to reduce the munjac deer numbers on the estate as one or two individuals have a shooting license, but more on that in next post.

The main clearance, or coppicing I should say, is done by felling the lines of Ash that were planted about 25 – 30 years back. Part of the reason is that Ash is quite a prolific plant that grows well and doesn’t take long to get to a height. Unfortunately this inhibits the Oaks growing beside it, so the Ash are taken out to give them some clear air.

Where's Paul?

For the ‘Where’s Wally/Waldo’ enthusiasts, let me present our own version of: Where’s Paul! Any eagled-eyed person able to spot him in the above photo?

Aside from that, the tree in the immediate foreground with the pile of stakes is an Oak. Now with an unrestricted canopy it can maximise it’s growth and do well. As for the stakes, these are cut out of the felled Ash and once sharpened they’ll be used in the upcoming hedgelaying competition the 2^nd February (Shameless plug #2). For more details check out shameless plug #1!

With the Ash trees on the floor, they are de-limbed and cut up into three metre lengths. Stakes are thrown to one side (literally!) ready to be pointed, while the timber is stacked on shorter bars for ease of picking up later on. 

Cutting, measuring & stacking, pointing stakes

As it stands I think there’s still a bit more work to be done before we move on to the next job, but it’s quite intensive like a lot of the work we do. By the way if you think I should be wearing my ear defenders on properly and not doing an orange ‘Mickey Mouse’ impression; rest assured I’m well out of the action at the far end of the row.

It’s also nice just being in the woods and enjoying the wildlife and peacefulness around us. Peaceful when there isn’t the roar of a chainsaw going off that is! Debbie (our illustrious photographer and forestry worker) pointed out some long-tailed tits the other day, which was a pleasure to see and all last week we’ve had the calls of Raven’s nearby. Foxes and even a shivery dog have been seen in the area too. The dog is actually Simon’s and usually accompanies us wherever we go; unless its tea-break time then he manages to pull a disappearing act just when we want a cuppa! But that’s another story.

One last word on the stakes; once they’re cut to the right length and pointed they are bundled up and stacked at the edge of the woodland for retrieving later. Currently we have just about two stacks with around 800 stakes in and easily more to bring out. Just don’t mention to Shane about carting them through the woods to stack up, as both of us did that all day over a week back. I’m sure my arms are longer now…

As always, photos are supplied by the lovely Debbie unless mentioned otherwise and feel free to check out our companion site too.

Oh and no one mention the Ash die-back ‘cos we ain’t got any here yet!

Dreary December (Part 2) - New Hedge

One technical difficulty I forgot to mention in the previous post was that our ever reliable chipper (haha!) decided to stop working halfway though the long pile of brash. Several attempts were made with limited success until it ceased working altogether. To top it all off the tractor had had enough as well and conked out halfway across the field!

Some of the early December mornings were a bit frosty, which made it ideal for a bit of hedge planting. The temporary perma-frost on the surface and enough firmness underneath made it easier to dig without the field turning into a quagmire. Yes, I realise that you can’t get temporary perma-frost because it ceases to become perma-frost but I couldn’t think of the correct phrase. If you know, answers on a postcard!

This may be snow or a heavy frost in the picture, I can’t really remember. Either way it was pretty cold! Mr. Orange is yours truly, with his trusty helper Paul doing the actual planting. 10 points to those who spotted the ‘Reservoir Dogs’ reference!

The plants themselves are ordered in and ‘heeled in’ nearby until we actually go to plant them out. Care is taken to make sure the roots aren’t damaged during the process, especially when we dig them in temporarily elsewhere; also making sure that the roots are covered in soil at all times. The bags you can just about see in the picture when they’re not camouflaged by frost/snow are used when we transport the plants so the roots don’t dry out and render them effectively useless.

This new hedge that is going in, divides an existing field in half. From what I understand we are re-instating a hedge line that would have been in here originally, in the probably 19^th century. It sits adjacent to the Mare’s Way that runs across the top of the Estate and nearby to Cobb’s Wood farm (more on that in later posts).

When it’s finished it will stretch about 200m (or there abouts) and contain approximately 500 individual plants. It is a double hedge in a way; one side is all hawthorns while the other side is a random mixture of blackthorn, hazel, dogwood, dog rose, spindle, wayfaring and one other that I can’t remember.

Although it is hard to see, this is only a small section of the hedge; still some way to go! Only half of the total length was planted by us on the forestry side, the other half was completed the following weekend by a volunteer group.

To protect the newly planted hedgerow, we used spiral guards and support canes to stop them being munched by hungry rabbits and other fauna such as squirrels (although they tend to wait until the y can climb it) and deer.

Unfortunately all did not go to plan in the end as the spacing device we knocked up (i.e. – built) wasn’t to the right dimensions and as such the gaps between the plants was not as desired. Also we had to be careful to make sure they were firmly treaded in afterwards and didn’t just pull out at the slightest tug! Not easy when the frost (or snow) thawed halfway through the planting and turned the solid field into a sloppy mess that added to by a week of rain that made the whole experience a bit boggy in more ways than one!

Finally though the sun emerged at the end and the first section of the hedgerow was complete. All that remained was the weekend of volunteers to plant the last section (Which happened to be even wetter and really, really, really sloppy by the time we had a look the following Tuesday).

As always, photos are courtesy of Debbie.

Oh and the chipper is still not in working order… but the tractor is back in the shed!

Dreary December (Part 1) – Hedge-Laying

We’re at the back end of the year now but there’s still plenty to do. Continuing from the previous month we were still tackling a stretch of hedge in between bouts of heavy wind and rain. Some days were better than others and we soldiered on laying the hedge. Nevertheless eventually we had it done in the end, which left us with a neat section of hedge in the midlands style (I think, although I’ve probably got that one wrong!).

Although there was a snag as we were left with a mountain of brash to chip up! Still all hands were available to reduce the mountain and create chippings that we can use within the hedge itself or often we spread them around younger trees and new hedges (more on that in part 2) to help improve moisture retention.

A former colleague joined us during the period of hedge-laying to help us out for a week and offered a few tips too. Having helped out laying the hedges on the Estate (but never actually done the laying myself), there does seem to be a bit of a knack to it.

From what I understand you cut in at an angle leaving a thin slither (but not too thin!) to allow the hedge plant to bend over. Depending on the style there is some siding-up involved, before, during and after the actual laying. The next step is where I come in, staking the hedge to hold it up and to prevent it blowing over in the wind.

Simple, you say? Well, like most things it sounds much easier than it is! I know my colleagues (Paul and Deb) who haven’t really laid any hedges before struggled a bit before they become more confident with the actual process. Even putting in the stakes (which we make on the Estate too, usually months in advance) takes some time to learn how to place them in correctly.

Like I mentioned before, the last thing we do is to chip up all the brash from the hedge. If we find we are a few stakes short, and when I say a few I don’t mean just a couple; we search through the spare branches and cut out anything long and straight enough to use in the hedge.

In the above picture you can see our ex-colleague Boz searching the brash for some useful poles while Paul and I carry on chipping.

Here’s a thought, how about that for the title of a new movie: Carry On Chipping!

The only other step we take when we lay a hedge for competition or where it’s most likely to be seen by the public is the binding. Again this differs between the different styles of hedge-laying but essentially you weave bindings, usually of willow (whips) across the top of the hedge, between the stakes.

Unfortunately I don’t have any pictures of the bindings but I do have one with the completed hedge and spare stakes that I think didn’t quite make the grade for the hedge!

Anyway, that’s all for this section on hedge-laying! I’ll probably write a more in depth post at some point with more detailed information, but coming next is part two of our work in December, coming in January!! Go figure.

Thanks to Deb for providing the images :)