This morning, I had a little bit longer to spend being purred upon by Soot (the 20 year old cat) before remembering to check Bicesters weather – as we were on our way to an event arranged by the Woodland Trust, and then shoved my feet into my walking boots, and jumped in the car at 8.52am.
The robot navigator started talking, house building was continuing near the retail park, we were on the motorway around Gaydon by 9.13am, and my phone said we were going at 100km/h; Oxfordshire was entered 5 minutes later, some massive warehouses were beside the road just before it crossed the River Cherwell, Stoke Lynn was arrived in at 9.40am – on a road unknown to Google Maps, and 5 minutes later we’d parked in a field, I saw a strange gooey phallic shaped object on the grass, and a person in a fluorescent jacket directed us to St Peters Church.
Inside, a big screen was showing the osprey camera at Loch Arkaig in Scotland, coffee and cake were on offer, and I grabbed a biscuit and put it in my bag (for blood sugar emergencies). Mum sat down at a table and started talking to a Japanese bloke about Upton House (a National Trust property), and I saw a cardboard King Charles in the corner of the room.
Noises of people dragging chairs around got deafening – due to the stone floor; someone called Darren Moorcroft (Chief executive of the Woodland Trust – wearing a Woodland Trust jacket) sat down at the table, and it was 10.20am when a woman got up and thanked everyone for coming, and said their aim was to make people feel special today. She said we’d be visiting Stoke Wood, pointed out the man called Darren, and people called Jenny, James, George, Helen, Jack and Vicky, and the fire exits – and said that if the fire alarm went off we would all walk out in a calm and orderly fashion (and that it had gone off at 4am this morning), that we are in tic season now and if people have concerns about tics and Lyme disease to talk to them, and to avoid having accidents because the paperwork is horrendous; the Japanese bloke started talking to Mum about organ playing, and it was 10.47am when we got on a bus.
We got off at 10.54am – gathering by a gate that said ‘HIGH WILDFIRE RISK’ on it, where a very thin man in a fluorescent jacket began describing Ash dieback, a big Golden Retriever (with owner) emerged from the trees, a man stood in front of us with a quivering neck and knees did something I forgot, another man was saying there’d been trees here since the 1600s, that we’d be looking at coppicing and Ash dieback work, and it was 11.04am when a wooded path was headed off upon. A volunteer stopped a few hundred metres along and talked about thinning of soft woods and chalky soil for wildflowers; the next stop was pointing out epiphytes [Wikipedia: An epiphyte is a plant or plant-like organism that grows on the surface of another plant and derives its moisture and nutrients from the air, rain, water or from debris accumulating around it] clinging on to a man-made wood bank (opposite farm land); by 11.20am we were between oak trees and a hazel coppice, and the volunteer in the florescent jacket did something I forgot; and the stop after that was in front of a Corsican pine planted in the 1800s. By then, the Japanese man was asking Mum if blackberries were safe to eat, and he continued to talk to her about growing things; a deer coppice was stopped by, and coppice blocks and deer rotation (and Monkjack and Roe being the most likely to see) were described, and I saw some paw prints in muddy splodges on the path.
At 11.43am, there was a stop by a tree and what was termed a ‘buffer strip’ between the wood and a wheat field, a stick thin (and very well spoken – early 70s) man wearing a very floppy sunhat told me I was being extraordinarily diligent and asked what I was doing, I showed him my info card and got questioned a bit about whether writing means I actually remember things, and then he seemed to get very nervous and said ‘forgive me for asking’.
Ash dieback was mentioned at the next stop ‐ where widening paths was the main topic; at 12pm we were in a sunny spot next to a wheat field, the volunteer leading things said Waitrose provided the hedge and 10 minutes later dead wood was stopped by, and the purpose was explained. OPM (which I was later informed means oak processionary moth) was an acronym repeatedly used by the fluorescent jacketed man while stood by a spruce tree; by the next stop – at 12.25pm – 1 bloke was talking to someone on his phone, the florescent jacketed man talked about Ash dieback and trying to clear the area of it; and then we entered a rather dark wood with multiple dead branches and hollow trees.
Dogs Mercury was pointed out by the florescent jacketed man at 12.32pm, someone sneezed very very loudly and bird twittering was very loud; 12.39pm was when sunlight was re-emerged into, and the florescent jacketed man mentioned edible dormice.
The coach got reboarded at 12.43pm, humidity was spectacular, and 5 minutes later we were back at the church, where there was lunch on offer.
Once seated at a table in an alcove with 4 other people (and Mum), the one called Darren Moorcroft (who had 4 little sandwiches on his plate) was talking about Lloyds Banks advisory centres for farmers, politicians, their patron being Judy Dench and her loving tall men – so wanting to have a photo with him, Princess Anne supporting the trust, 1 of their trustees owning Fortnum and Mason (and receiving a meeting request from her private secretary today), a 2019 mountainous garden was mentioned, and then a man seated at the table asked what I was doing, and I showed him my info card. Chairs began to be heaved around a bit, a woman was knitting something without looking at it, and I went and explained myself to John and asked if I could take photos, which he said I could – and gave me a business card sort of card of his.
His presentation began at about 1.35pm, and involved a lot about ancient woodland, the licence planting scheme (begun in October 2021), the report done in 2021 about the state of the UKs trees, tree fodder was mentioned, followed by woodland creation, tree disease, community forestry, the Stump Up For Trees thing in the Brecon Beacons -planting one million trees, the More Woods scheme, the emergency tree fund, he said he started with the Trust in 1995, and then said some stuff about butterfly population and woodland planting statistics. A man called Jack came next – talking about the threats to woods and trees, the bells chimed 2pm while he was on his Impacts Of Development slide, and the Nitrogen Pollution slide had a picture of algal gloop on it (and Mum had started violently hiccupping).
Afternoon tea became available at 2.20pm (cookies, brownies, and homemade doughnuts), and some more chatting went on for 10 minutes; Darren Moorcroft got up again at that point and encouraged everyone to go to Glyn Finglas (by Loch Lomond), compared ancient woodland to Westminster Abbey and how if someone wanted to put a train track through Westminster Abbey everyone would be up in arms, their ambitions to plant 100 million trees by the end of this decade (55 million have been done), The Young Peoples Forest in Derbyshire was mentioned, he said he joined the Trust in 2017 (and I spotted a woman at the back of the room with a face mask on); then Q & A s began – with ‘how do you avoid clashing with other charities such as the RSPB and The National Trust?’ (and someone’s phone went off) and then ‘are you working with housing organisations?’, those were the only 2 asked, that was it, and feedback forms were handed out as we left.
The car was oven like, so we sat there with the doors open for a while; and once moving, what to put in the feedback form was discussed (about the length of the walk, the terrain, and the labelling of the food),and the different styles of education our different generations are used to. Warwickshire was re-entered at 3.42pm, the car said it was 26°C by then, and sweat continued to pour off me; and home was reached at 4.10pm.
