Stourhead Estate, Wiltshire

By Kind permission of Nick C Hoare

THEME:

Moving the forest towards its full potential in the face of climate change, ensuring it is sustainable, both biologically and financially, and resilient in the long term.

The day will include an introduction to Stourhead forest, and discussion on forest resilience, sustainability, irregular silviculture, biodiversity in irregular conifer dominated forest and forest monitoring. For more details of the theme, the estate and the planned visit, please use this link. 

Rendezvous time – 9.30 hrs, Friday 9^th May 2025

Meeting point – Main National Trust Stourhead Carpark, Stourton, Warminster BA12 6QF

Please park vehicles in the overflow carpark at the back, indicated by following in-carpark CCFG signs. 

Carpark facilities – There are National Trust toilets and a café at the carpark.

Vehicle consolidation – After an introduction, attendees will need to please share vehicles from here, thereby minimising in-forest traffic. The tour will take place in the main Stourhead Forest (within 6km). Metalled tracks are suitable for cars driven slowly (avoid cars with low sumps).

What to bring – Suitable in-forest footwear and waterproofs. For biosecurity, please ensure footwear is clean before arrival.

Lunch and drink – As we will be picnicking in the forest, please bring your own lunch, drink and snack requirements. We will NOT be returning to the National Trust Stourhead Carpark at lunch time. There will be a portaloo located near to the lunch stop in the forest.

Finish time – Back to the National Trust Stourhead Carpark by 16.00 hrs.

Booking – is essential. To allow for good discussion and facilitate logistics, places at the meeting will be limited in number. Priority will be given to CCFG members, and there will be a waiting list if numbers exceed this so please let us know if you cannot make it. To book, please click this link. 

For any queries, please contact Polly Spencer-Vellacott, CCFG Administrator. 

CCFG will be hosting their next webinar – Biomass – Fuel – Silviculture: The role of CCF in fire prevention- with Alex Held – on Thursday 23rd January 2025 4-5.30pm.

Weather permitting, all biomass can become fuel for a wildfire. Fire spread is determined by the fire behaviour influencing factors: weather, topography, and fuels. While we foresters cannot modify weather nor topography, biomass (fuel) we can indeed modify and with this have positive or negative influence on fire spread, fire intensity and its severity and negative effects. CCF is providing a toolbox of silvicultural measures to increase our forests resilience in that regard.

Alexander Held holds an MSc in Forest Science from Freiburg University, Germany. He started as a fire ecologist at the Fire Ecology working group of the Max-Planck Society, got a number of operational qualifications in the US and South Africa. He moved from fire ecology to fire management and worked with the Global Fire Monitoring Center GFMC in Europe and Southern Africa. Later, Alex worked with the South African Working on Fire Program, from its early beginnings till 2012, when he joined EFI.

At EFI, Alex works on the current project Waldbrand-Klima-Resilienz, where the exchange of expertise and knowledge, mutual assistance and cooperation in Europe is the tool to create more resilient landscapes and better-informed fire management for Germany. His expertise is in fire management, silviculture and deer management for resilient forests.

See examples of Alex’s work in media here.

To book your place please visit this link. 

Continuous Cover Forestry Question Time – CCFQT2

Please join us for our second online CCF question time on Thursday 21st November at 4pm. Our Chair, Jonny Hulson, will be joined by a panel of foresters: Hazel Cowan, Andrew Leslie and David Pengelly. The panel members will reply to questions about any aspect of CCF. The questions can either be provided in advance or posted during the session (the panel would appreciate some advance notice of as many questions as possible!).

• • Hazel Cowan has been a forest manager for over 25yrs working mainly in the north of Scotland on private estates for Cawdor Forestry Ltd. She has been fortunate to have worked in forests where she has been able to practice CCF, almost exclusively with Scots pine using group selection systems or strip felling. Hazel has learnt that CCF requires a lot of patience and that you don’t always get it right first time! She’s also starting to underplant larch and initiate regeneration of Douglas fir.
  • Andrew Leslie is a forestry educator and researcher with more than thirty five years’ experience across a range of jobs and countries. He has managed silvicultural research in the UK and in Somalia, Lesotho, Vanuatu and Guyana covering natural forest through to plantations and temperate to tropical and across a range of different cultural environments. Currently Andrew is part of a team at Forest Research conducting silvicultural and wood properties research, with specific responsibility for CCF, short rotation forestry and species mixtures. For twenty four years he led the development and management of undergraduate and postgraduate degree courses in forestry, delivered through part-time, distance-learning and full-time teaching at the National School of Forestry.
  • David Pengelly is a fellow of the ICF. Having worked in the forestry industry since the 1980’s and operated as an independent manager and consultant since 1997, he has considerable experience in a broad range of forestry related issues. David’s client base includes large estates, voluntary organisations, public sector and smaller privately owned woodlands, covering a range of forest and woodland types. David has particular expertise in timber harvesting and marketing. He is a director of SelectFor Ltd and Partner of D&H Pengelly Forestry & Agi-environment Consultants. David is responsible for several properties where owners’ objectives are met through the long-term application of Continuous Cover Forestry principles, resulting in the emergence of well-developed permanently irregular stand structures.

This is a second event along the lines of the previous event held in March this year, with a slightly longer timeslot. Booking is essential, please use this link. 

 

Thetford forest, East Anglia

Transforming productive coniferous woodland with forest health and drought risks

Thetford forest, managed by Forestry England (FE), is the largest pine plantation in England. The fact that it was established in a relatively short period of time, just over 100 years ago, almost exclusively with Scots and later Corsican pine shapes the forest today and underlies many of the issues threatening its future thriving.

This site visit will feature large-scale underplanting as a way to transform even-aged coniferous monocultures. We will visit sites at different stages of the underplanting process to showcase and discuss operational considerations of species choice, site preparation and ongoing management of the underplanted sites; explaining what the main catalyst for larger scale underplanting was, why underplanting was chosen as the main method, and what the main operational considerations and ways to addressed them have been.

We plan to visit Forest Research (FR) operational trial testing growth of a wide range of tree species in the open and understory conditions. Chris Reynolds (FR) will walk us through the design, goals and the first outcomes of this trial.

FE foresters promise to share a comprehensive picture of their rationale, evidence, practical considerations and long-term plans and look forward to discussing principles and application of CCF in the context of forest health, soil, climate and herbivore pressures.

Meeting point (to be confirmed): Santon Downham Forestry England – parking lot. 

The tour will take place in the main block of Thetford forest, further details to be confirmed. 

What to bring

PPE Boots suitable for rough ground and waterproofs. For biosecurity, please ensure that your footwear is clean before arrival.

Lunch and drink: Bring your own food and drink for lunch and snacks.

Finish

By around 4.00pm

Booking

Essential. To allow for good discussion and facilitate logistics, the meeting will be limited to 30 people. There will be a waiting list if numbers exceed this so please let us know if you cannot make it. To book, please follow this link. 

CCFG visit to Achray Forest Aberfoyle managed by Forestry and Land Scotland

CCF opportunities and challenges for amenity, conservation and production

The Achray Face above Aberfoyle is an extremely popular area for forest recreation with walking and cycling trails, a visitor centre and Go-Ape attraction and has long been identified as potential for management under CCF. It is also one of the trial areas of the pan-European SUPERB project. However, the Region is now facing significant challenges to this plan in particular a high proportion of larch and windblow along with the high visitor numbers and access.

The forest also supports mature oak woodland which has been managed in the past and there is potential for future intervention both for timber and to encourage natural regeneration.

Away from the main recreation area circa 60ha have been as identified as potential for management under CCF. This area offers an opportunity to realise the benefits of CCF for softwood sawlog production in the future.

The visit will be a chance to enjoy the forest, explore these challenges and discuss options with the local forest team. After an introduction in the Lodge we will undertake two walking tours through Achray forest. The first is in the mature conifer and oak forest of the high recreation area above the Lodge and the second a quieter area of conifer forest at Braeval at the east of the forest.

The visit details

We will gather at the Lodge (9:30am for 10:00am) and have a half hour introduction to the area from the local team and Forest Research who are leading on the SUPERB project

Minibuses will be used for transport to and within the forest. They will leave from the Lodge at 10.30am

Two walks (2.4 miles and 1.2 miles) on forest roads and paths with some downhill and uphill sections. Expect to walk into some of the stands for the discussion. Lunch will be taken in the forest.

Following the webinar on 23rd May with Victoria Stokes talking about an experiment in underplanting in conifers at Clocaenog Forest, a recording has now been made available on  YouTube which you can view using this link.  

 

Study Tour To Wallonia, Belgium

Monday 2nd – Thursday 5th September 2024

CCFG will be hosting their next webinar – Underplanting of conifers in Britain – with Victoria Stokes – on Thursday 23rd May 2024 4-5pm.

Underplanting is a relatively little-used technique for establishing trees while avoiding the disadvantages of clearfelling and may become increasingly important where a change of species is desirable. This webinar will report results from an underplanting experiment in the long-running CCF trial area at Clocaenog Forest in North Wales. Survival and growth of five different conifer species planted under a mature Sitka spruce overstorey will be compared. Impacts of the subsequent thinning operations and the final overstorey removal on survival of the underplanted seedlings will be presented, and responses of the five species to the removal of the overstorey 9 years after planting will be examined. Some operational “lessons learned” will also be highlighted.

Victoria is a Senior Scientist in the Silviculture and Wood Properties Science Group at Forest Research. She has over 20 years’ experience in carrying out research on management of Britain’s forests to increase resilience to climate change and biotic threats, whilst maintaining productivity. She leads research on Upland Silviculture, focussing on management techniques which increase tree species diversity and stand age structure, such as Continuous Cover Forestry. She has contributed to many collaborative projects and is a Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Foresters.

To book your place please visit this link. 

Fern, a European organisation campaigning to protect forests, has published a report including several case studies of Continuous Cover Forestry and the financial obstacles they faced. To read more, follow this link. 

Following the webinar on 21st March with Danny Alder talking about the biodiversity research project on the Rushmore Estate on the Dorset-Wiltshire border looking at the responses of woodland birds, bats and woodland plants to different stand management, a recording has now been made available on  YouTube which you can view using this link. 

You can also watch Andy Poore’s talk on Applying CCF in Lowland Broadleaved Woods, which also refers to the Rushmore Estate, but was recorded in October 2021.