Coppice & Cawl
We’re running this again in 2017, click here for details
Come and join woodland skills tutor James Kendall for a day of learning traditional woodland management and coppicing skills in the beautiful native woods at Denmark Farm nature reserve. And when we’re not outside with our tools we’ll be warm and snug in the farm enjoying a hearty lunch of Welsh cawl (traditional lamb stew) served with local Hafod cheese and freshly baked bread. Good winter fuel for woodspeople.
This course costs just £20 per person.
This one-day course is ideal for anyone who has access to woodland and wants to learn some skills to manage it better for wildlife and for coppice products such as bean poles, pea sticks, firewood and greenwood crafts.
The day will include:-
- Tree identification
- Coppicing
- Snedding & High Pruning
- Ideas for craft projects using coppiced wood
- Creating wildlife habitat piles and windrows
- Using hand tools safely in the woodland
- Making bean poles and pea sticks
So what is coppicing? Well it’s an ancient form of woodland management, that involves repetitive felling of the same stump, near to ground level, and then allowing the shoots to regrow from that main stump. Coppicing creates a variety of micro-habitats within a woodland which become homes for specialised wildlife such as dormice and butterflies. Denmark Farm have been runnng a dormouse nestbox scheme for many years and we hope to create more habitat for these special mammals throgh coppicing.
Coppicing also produces loads of useful timber products that are still used today. Woodlands that have a reason to be managed, perhaps for timber, firewood, access or green woodworking, are more likely to receive love and attention long into their future, and indeed those woodlands that we have today have survived precisely because they have had an economic value to the local community, “the wood that pays is the wood that stays.”
The future of our woodlands relies on effective management, just as a garden needs constant maintenance and care to thrive. Trees must be thinned to grow well and invasive species like bramble have to be managed so that they don’t dominate other plants.
Tools and gloves will be provided. Please wear warm, waterproof clothes and appropriate boots. Wellies can be provided if required.
The course is suitable for anyone aged 16 or over with a passion to learn more about traditional woodland management.
This event cannot be booked directly through the Denmark Farm website.