Location: Chapelwood Coppice
Date: 07.01.11
Time: 10- 12
Flickr Slideshow
The Cardiff Friday Mornings Project kicked off the New Year with a coppice of mature hazel in partnership with Kevin one of Cardiff Council's Community Park Rangers.
Date: 07.01.11
Time: 10- 12
Flickr Slideshow
The Cardiff Friday Mornings Project kicked off the New Year with a coppice of mature hazel in partnership with Kevin one of Cardiff Council's Community Park Rangers.
This gem of a woodland has some of the finest mature stools of hazel in Cardiff which in combination with patches of dense brambles and some woodbine (honeysuckle) is ideal habitat for the dormouse which is a European Protected Species.
We were tasked today with coppicing some of these stools to ground level which will allow the trees to rejuvinate. This process has been practiced in the UK for thousands of years. Like then, Kevin plans to use the cut material for alternative uses. Next week the rangers will be performing some hedgelaying with the stakes and binders coming from the woods today.
The group over the last couple of months have performed some coppicing so now know their way around the trees and tools, but these were the largest they had cut so far.
With each stool, we cut from stems from the outside to the inside of the stool and we processed each stem as we cut them. The thicker stems were cut into 5.5 ft lengths while the thinner sections were left longer to be the hedgelaying binders.
Stacks were made of stakes and binders and at the end of the morning we transported these back to the truck and tied them down securely.
The left over brash was stacked into habitat piles. Traditionally, these would be sub-separated into pea-sticks (useful in gardens or allotments) and the smaller brash collected into bundles called faggots for firing the ovens at home. In future coppices, it would be great to tie this in with allotment members who would take away the pea sticks back to their allotments.
For more information contact Chris on 07717 412 270 or chris.partridge@keepwalestidy.org
We were tasked today with coppicing some of these stools to ground level which will allow the trees to rejuvinate. This process has been practiced in the UK for thousands of years. Like then, Kevin plans to use the cut material for alternative uses. Next week the rangers will be performing some hedgelaying with the stakes and binders coming from the woods today.
The group over the last couple of months have performed some coppicing so now know their way around the trees and tools, but these were the largest they had cut so far.
With each stool, we cut from stems from the outside to the inside of the stool and we processed each stem as we cut them. The thicker stems were cut into 5.5 ft lengths while the thinner sections were left longer to be the hedgelaying binders.
Stacks were made of stakes and binders and at the end of the morning we transported these back to the truck and tied them down securely.
The left over brash was stacked into habitat piles. Traditionally, these would be sub-separated into pea-sticks (useful in gardens or allotments) and the smaller brash collected into bundles called faggots for firing the ovens at home. In future coppices, it would be great to tie this in with allotment members who would take away the pea sticks back to their allotments.
For more information contact Chris on 07717 412 270 or chris.partridge@keepwalestidy.org
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