A new wood full of potential for business and nature

Hi, I'm Chelsea and this is Phil. And we bought our plot of land in 2021. We've used the MOREwoods scheme to help fill the land with native trees. We joined up with our neighbouring plot owners and it was sort of a toss-up in the end between the Forestry Commission Grant and the MOREwoods scheme, but the MOREwoods scheme was much more approachable. It was a really streamlined and speedy process and we managed to fit it all within about a six month time gap, from the beginning of the application to the arrival of the trees.

So, we had a visit from an outreach adviser called Ian and he was brilliant. He'd worked in forestry for many years and so he knew a lot about what would work in our location, but he also was sympathetic to our plans. And I think we - he kind of just um enriched what we'd already planned and just gave us the confidence to go ahead with it. We decided we didn't want borders, we didn't want boundaries between the two plots of land. The Woodland Trust made it very easy actually to kind of link up the applications and we actually, both plots got our trees at the same time. So we're actually through the whole process together.

The subsidy helped us tremendously to get a bulk load of trees that we love and to make a real project out of it. We're confident that the trees we planted will provide increased biodiversity, with the ride we've got a wildlife corridor which is almost east to west. And yeah we've already seen a huge difference, letting grass grow, letting pockets of nettles come up, we've seen a huge boost in insects, and then birds. The water retention as well, of the the trees, we've noticed the difference already. There was pooling in this top field behind us, the first year it was marshy and boggy and we've noticed such a difference in that already.

With my woodwork, I plan to coppice a lot of the sweet chestnut and the reason we've kind of planted in strips, separated strips is so that we can allow as much light to them as possible which means we can get away with coppicing smaller areas which will have less of a detrimental effect on the biodiversity. I'll be able to do a small area at a time which would be enough for me to manage as an independent woodworker. I'm expecting to do a first coppice you know in around the 10-year mark. Which will just get as many shoots up as possible and then from then on it be around the 20-year mark. So, I might get one maybe two in my lifetime.

We've faced a few challenges, we've been up against the weather, we planted our trees actually during Storm Arwen. We faced challenges with our our local council in terms of creating a natural space for people to enjoy, for our local community.

If we were to acquire more land in the future we would 100% go for the MOREwoods scheme. It was so easy the whole process and they were so helpful and yeah we felt fully supported the whole way. I would without a doubt if I had - if I could afford it I would definitely get another plot. I would absolutely love to do it again.