The felling of the Sycamore Gap tree on Hadrian’s Wall has had a huge amount of media attention, from the discovery of the crime on 28th September 2023, the morning after Storm Agnes, to last week’s conviction of two men for the criminal damage to the tree. It’s not at all a woodland tree, but I think there are some important rural issues that are part of the story but which the media have mostly glossed over.
Yesterday I took the tractor and trailer round to gather some piles of firewood I’d felled and cut up in January and February. Some of these were right next to the rides and easy to get to, but a couple were way off any of the rides behind tangles of brambles and fallen branches. Despite this, I was able to get the tractor in by finding a roundabout route since it’s narrow enough to get through gaps and has enough power to get over smaller logs and stumps.
Last year I finally read Ben Law’s book “Woodlander” from 2021. I’d read his “Woodand Way” (published 2001) and “Woodsman” (2013), and he is a prominent advocate for traditional woodland management and crafts. “Woodlander” is billed as “a guide to sustainable woodland management”. It’s a very good introduction to the subject and I think works best in mapping out all the pieces of the woodland management and ecosystems jigsaw, and giving people new to woodlands signposts about the more detailed advice they may need in practice. It’s also a pleasure to be taken on a tour of the subject by the man himself. On the strength of it, I got his “Woodland Workshop” and “Woodland Craft” books over Christmas.
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