Countryside Services

Wattle hurdles, originally designed for sheep pens, make excellent garden fences.

Rose arch Wattle arch made to your dimensions.

Bean poles 8 ft hazel poles for growing running beans.

Pea sticks Bushy plant supports.

Carved walking sticks. Hand carved varnished fork-top walking sticks

Stakes for hedge laying, to support shrubs and small trees or general plant supports (5 ft 6 ins long.)

Binders used in hedge laying (10 to 12 ft long flexible rods.)

Thatching gads ready for splitting to make thatching spars.

Our hazel products are cut from well managed coppice woods in Hampshire. The coppice is normally cut on a six year to eight year rotation. The coppice grows back from the stumps (called stools.) It is cut again when it has grown back to a useable size to continue the cycle. This is an ancient and extremely sustainable process. There is archaeological evidence of coppicing in Britain dating back to 5000BC. Surprisingly, coppiced hazel trees normally live much longer than ones that are not coppiced.

The firewood that we sell is from coppice that has grown beyond the normal six to eight year cycle, making it too thick for other uses. Cutting overgrown hazel coppice is important to restore the wood for productive coppicing. All of the carbon in trees, and hence in our firewood, is from CO₂ in the atmosphere.

Coppice woods are rich in species diversity. The cutting cycle provides a varied habitat from an area of wild grassland (following the cut); areas with differing heights and density of woodland growth from previous cuts; to dense woodland (the next area to be cut) that offers protection for insects, animals and nesting birds. We only cut coppice in winter when many species are dormant and birds are not nesting. Many coppice woods also include large trees (standards) such as ash and oak that are cut and replanted on a much longer cycle, providing an even greater variety of habitats.