Sean and Sarah's wood

Yesterday we went to visit our friends Sean and Sarah in their wood in West Sussex, about 60 miles from us. It's a very different wood from ours, mostly hazel coppice with dense oak standards and self-seeded ash.They've done some coppicing but haven't started thinning the standards yet, though they've been talking to the Forestry Commission to get advice on this.

Their woodland has much more clay than ours, and is a lot wetter. As a result there are many more flowers, including orchids:
violets:and primroses:
They've been making charcoal with some of the hazel they've coppiced, selling it in a local shop. Sean explained how the kilns worked
and showed us the results of the latest burn in the small kiln:There were loads of birds in their wood, and quite a bit of nest-making activity right near where we were having lunch:
They have a bird feeder up too:
which gave some great opportunities for photos of birds flying. If only the sun had been out I'd have been able to use a faster shutter and avoided the wings blurring...

Sean suggested our mystery tree might be a crab apple. This isn't something I'd considered as I'd assumed I'd have noticed the fruit. But perhaps not, so we'll keep an eye one it.

Mike