Williamson's Weekly Nature Notes

Wherever I go in the county I see neglected coppices.

Hazel woods with oak standards were once the normal forest crop of southern Britain.

For many hundreds of years, even back to Roman times, they supplied the wood for boats, ploughs, hurdles, houses, barrels, mugs and even First World War aeroplanes.

Now we use pine, spruce and fir '“ and, of course, metal and plastic. That's fine. The world we know could not exist without it. What I'm on about is that many ancient coppice woods are still there but no longer managed properly.

The hazel has grown too tall to allow all those wildlife goodies to exist any more. They have been shaded out. Look at my pictures of wood anemones, taken in the nature reserve around my home. Volunteers have cut the hazel coppice to let the light in so the flowers swarm in spring.

It is so beautiful here. The hazel will be cut every eight years as a renewable crop. People buy the poles or stems for garden material. The wind flowers are happy with that.

They can get the light they need, have a rest at the end of the cycle and start again at the beginning.

Lots of birds such as nightingale, lesser whitethroat and cuckoo breed in the coppice after it has grown up again for a year or two. Dormice find shelter in the roots and food from the hazelnuts.

Thirty different sorts of butterflies like to live inside coppice woods when they are cut regularly because their caterpillars can feed on the spring flowers. Fritillary caterpillars feed on violets, orange tips feed on cuckoo flowers, gatekeepers feed on the grass and purple emperor caterpillars feed on the willow leaves that often live in well-cut coppice woods.

Many owners of ancient coppice woods just don't know what to with them and have no idea of their potential for wildlife.

Surely there must be farmers/foresters out there who own coppice woods and would love to see such a rich return of wildlife if they managed these ancient, rare habitats properly? In the woods here are 300 species of flowers, 45 breeding birds, 31 butterflies, 350 moths, 60 rare bees and wasps '“ the list goes on. All crammed into 40 acres. It's amazing. It could be yours too.

This feature first appeared in the West Sussex Gazette April 2. To read it first, buy the West Sussex Gazette every Wednesday.