![]() John asked what the best plan would be, to renovate these trees. This is definitely the first thing to do: clear away everything other than Hazel, including ivy, brambles, and anything else growing around the base. Here's a picture of one of them, half-way though the holly clearance: So, this question: John said that he has been asked to renovate a couple of very old coppiced Hazels, which were choked with holly at the base, and are very congested. You are probably also familiar with pollarded street trees: this is just coppicing at a higher point above the ground. In fact, the very name "copse" means an area of coppiced woodland. You can see them everywhere: next time you are out for a walk, or visiting a stately home, look at any areas of woodland that you pass, and check out the trunks: are they all one-trunk-per-tree? Or do some of the trees appear to have multiple stems, all sprouting from the ground? These are the remains of old coppicing. We don't make our own walking sticks, or fences, or hurdles: we don't make our own charcoal, either! So most of the coppiced woodlands have been left to return to the wild, over the last 50 years or more. ![]() This is usually seen on trees such as Hazel, Willow and Sweet Chestnut, but is also used for Oak, Lime, Alder: depending on what the trees were to be used for.Īlas, these days we don't need much coppiced wood: we don't burn faggots (bundles) of thin wood, we buy in seasoned and chopped hardwood. When they are big enough, they are all cut off at the same time, and the cycle repeats. These new shoots will all be pretty much the same size as each other: so instead of one big central trunk with a lot of smaller, wiggly side branches, you get a whole bunch of same-sized shoots, and because they are crowded together, they fight for the light, which means they grow up vertically, nice and straight. It involves repeatedly chopping a young tree down to - usually - ankle height, which prompts it to send up new shoots from the chopped base. Now, before we get on to what to do with it, a quick reminder about coppicing: time out of mind, it was a way of managing woodlands, in order to produce useable materials for fencing, furniture, firewood and fodder - all sorts of things. The picture on the left shows a selection of cut hazel rods that will be graded, then bound in bunches before being moved off site.Last week, I received a question: what to do with an enormously overgrown old Hazel coppice. There is some nice birch,ash and alder also growing on this site and they will all be left as overstory trees. I am concentrating on removing the hazel on this site, but I will also remove some willow to allow light in to reach the coppiced stools in order to aid regrowth. Although this site has not been cut in some time there is evidence of paths cut across the site and I will be mindful to keep these paths clear so that I can use the Ironhorse to traverse these paths and then take the material out, I’m sure it will be a challenge but it will be interesting to see how it works out. This site is situated on a steep river bank and one of the challenges will be moving the cut material to the roadside for delivery to the Heritage Park. ![]() ![]() The picture on the right shows what is left after the hazel has been cut, it is important to cut as low to the ground as possible. Laois two years ago and over the duration of the course the chief instructor, Eoin Donnelly mentioned some of the uses of coppiced wood. I took a coppice silviculture course with Muintir na Coille in Stradbally, Co. Once the hazel is back in a short rotation it is conceivable to do the work with a hand saw or bill hook but when it gets this big it is quicker and easier to take the work on with a chainsaw. Before the advent of chainsaws this work would have been done with an edged slashing tool. This picture shows the hazel before cutting, you can also see my chainsaw at the base of the hazel stool.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |