Dugout

 

We came across a partially constructed, sometime abandoned dugout on our walk this morning. We pass this way regularly, and haven't previously noticed the site, even though it looks as if it's been there for some time. It would've been fairly well camouflaged mind. There's a wall of sticks once clearly daubed with clay, grass and moss build on a platform of excavated clay, evidence suggests it once had a roof; it's not very big though, 1.5m by 2m say. I can think of better locations and conditions, it's very wet abouts, even in the dry season. Still, bravo for having a go I say, and better luck next time. I have to admit to having considered building something out myself.

Barrow Moor track

A view along the track running through Barrow Moor along the edge of Woosons' Hill enclosure. I know there were forestry trains running through this part of the forest transporting timber to the nearby sawmill at Millyford Bridge during the First World War. I'm not sure whether this track was the route of one of them, but it has a certain something to it that makes me feel it might have been.  That aside, look at the vibrancy of the mosses, how green everything is, this is being replicated in pockets all over the forest. Though not marked on maps highlighting remaining islands of British temperate rainforest, a number of areas in the forest exhibit many of the identifying features and species, and that appears to be increasing every year.

Heart of the forest

At the heart of the forest are it's streams, and the heart of those streams are the springs, spreads and collects that feed them.

Scratch

Tis but a scratch.

Four beech sisters

Until a couple of years back there were five beech sisters standing on a promontory of open ancient woodland between two fingers of boggy stream. Standing so close to one and other, in relative isolation, they were quite a feature, then one storm the sister most exposed on the edge of the slope, was slighted. Now, the four remaining sister beeches form a tight square symmetry, to remain a feature in the woods, just a different one. If anything, a more striking and enigmatic one. Four holds some significant importance too: the four seasons, the four cardinal points (I must check the trees orientation), the four elements, or the four cross quarter days, to name a few.  It's a place that has presence. I've always passed through, I think though maybe I should stop for a while sometimes, take time to take things in. I do wonder though, if over time and so closely anchored, a battle royale of endurance will develop, or maybe their intimacy will bind them in strength and immovable tenacity.  That's a long game, mind, and will take many many years to resolve. In the meantime, a quartet of fine beeches.

Barrow Moor

Barrow Moor deep in the forest, an ancient woodland packed with plenty of majestic pre enclosure trees, is always good walking. It's an interesting woodland, in a ruffled landscape, and being the headwaters of one of the forests many smaller tributary streams, several of the ruffles are bog filled making navigation difficult and confusing if you don't know the area. If you do know the area and you're canny about your route, you don't have to travel far to travel far. By which I mean you can walk for two or three miles in the same relatively small area of woodland without walking the same path twice (beyond a couple of nodal points and causeways), nor ever seeing the same views, and although they may well often be the same trees seen differently different aspects are illuminated. I walk Barrow Moor like this frequently, and I never get bored of it. It's a tardis of a wood. 

Carry me

And together in this mad land
Far from the truest of hands
Well I'll carry you
If you'll carry me
Carry me
Carry me friend
Oh carry me 

The Levellers, Carry me, 1990

Des bois amour

There are always things to be found in the forest, if you look, that is.  Walk off the beaten track, keep you eyes open and you're bound to come across something. And, they're all part of a story. Hundred's of stories that I only see fragments of.  I'm not complaining, mind. I enjoy finding things, they often make me smile, and I enjoy letting my mind wander as I ponder the what's, the who's and the whys.

Mark Ash winter sun

The low winter sun burst through the ancient stands of Mark Ash this morning, flooding the woodland in a wonderful light. Lovely. The woodland's quiet, though you'd be mistaken to think there's nothing going on, look and you see ponies grazing, frenetic squirrels, small birds flitting about drooped bracken, large birs looking on from high perches, a cautiously deer drinks from a water born rivulet, aware that the open forest left it exposed, it disappears quickly as we approach. There's plenty going on it the winter forest, it's just happening, for the most part, in understated ways.

Naked

Held firm now in winters embrace, with the fall near complete, our forest stands in naked glory, the ancient leviathans of Mark Ash's, Barrow Moor, once again stand in magnificent isolation, in suspension, enjoying their rest and waiting for a new cycle to begin. The forest feels open and exposed now.

Beletus aereus.....I think?

Autumn tints

The forest's Beech are slowly taking on autumn tints, and they look radiant. Though they'll need to be quick, as the winds are taking their toll, and already the canopies thin. We were walking through blizzards of falling leaves at times on today's walk, and on the forest floor a colourful litter is forming. It's a good time to be out in the forest, that said, it's always a good time to be out in the forest.