Stonyfield Wood

I am sorry to relate that Stonyfield Woods (at the top of the slope to the north of Court Farm in Halling) has undergone a brutal bout of coppicing. Stonyfield is (sorry, was) largely chestnut coppice, but there were some mature single specimen trees in their absolute prime that have been taken down as well as the coppice stuff.  A few mature but rather twisty oaks and beech (the non-coppicing trees) have mercifully been left behind as might be expected.

Yes, coppicing was long overdue, but I always thought that single specimen trees got left. You can see the size of some of the trees taken out by the size of the logs in the picture below. A ring count showed some of them to be over 90 years old.  Why the sudden demand for timber after all this time?

I was puzzled by this as Cemex (or at least, their tenants) have been pretty good at looking after the extensive swathe of SSSI woodland (the Halling and Trottiscliffe Escarpment) that runs to the north of Pilgrim’s Road across the top of the hill and down either side of Bush Valley to Warren Road.  They kept the footpaths and farm tracks clear and the brambles under control and pretty much left the trees alone.

But it seems it doesn’t belong to Cemex any more.  After some tortuous dealings with the Land Registry, it seems that Cemex have sold their land holdings off, mostly to the same people who have just bought Court and Brookers Farm: Vineyard Farms a.k.a. MDCV Ltd). It seems that, not content with ploughing up that wonderful valley for their vineyard, the Vineyard folk are now attacking the woods as well. 

Why now, I wonder? Any tree felling works in an SSSI require a licence from the forestry commission (though I guess Cemex simply transferred that to the new owners as they are good for 10 years). But Natural England also have to grant permission for tree felling as well. The work is being done by Tilhill, who check out as a pretty responsible company (no Environment Agency prosecutions, anyway), so one assumes all is in order.  (Update: it was. I checked with the Forestry Commission and there is a felling licence in place, although Natural England said they could find no record for permission for SSSI woodland tree work "at the moment." But NE are pretty hopeless, to be honest, and I actually trust Tilhill, after talking to their guys doing the work in the woods.)

It doesn’t really matter. The trees will quickly grow back. But Stonyfield was home to a thriving colony of White Admiral butterflies. Their larvae feed on honeysuckle on which they hibernate over the winter, and have doubtless been destroyed along with the trees.

They are pretty fussy about the condition of the honeysuckle they lay their eggs on. They like straggly stuff in the shade on a stand about 10 feet high but with the bottom couple of meters free from nearby brambles etc, as that's where they lay their eggs. The larvae aren't hard to find at this stage as they sit on the tips of the centre stem of the tip of honeysuckle leaf and nibble either side away. In September they fold a honeysuckle leaf over themselves and settle down to hibernate until around late March. A couple of years ago I found four of these "hibernacula" on a big stand of honeysuckle on a tree that had blown over in a storm. I was able to raise the caterpillars through to adulthood in the spring, releasing them back at Stonyfield, which was very rewarding.  

In July on a sunny day you could often see as many as a dozen of these beautiful insects (and that's a lot, for this species) flying through the dappled sunlight on the main path, with their powerful wing-beats followed by a characteristic glide. 

But no more. White Admirals are not a protected species (though they should be - they are scarce) and the coppicing of woodland in SSSI areas is not illegal assuming the right licensing and permissions are in place, so Vineyard Farms have broken no laws.

But they are not endearing themselves to anyone at the moment, or at least, not to me.