So I will begin by saying Yesterday’s outing to the copse with Fred went very well (relatively speaking) compared with the walk this mornings walk in my local woodland. The Copse is open to anyone including local children on holiday from school to enjoy playing in there. Fred chasing after teenage girls playing ‘it’ was a bad as it got. He spent a lot of time with me on the lead. But when it was empty he had a jolly good run and look around. Me I just didn’t quite finish properly what I wanted to achieve and will need to return without Fred.
So I have noticed in my local woodlands where I have been walking with Fred over a few weeks now, lots, countless numbers of these ‘dens’ made from logs laying around on the woodland floor. Some the result of coppicing others just fallen branches. I have been taking photos of these on our walks.
I remember making a den exactly like this on an excursion to the woods when my children were young and I even took the neighbours children along with us. We spent the afternoon mading a log den exactly like these. I asked the Kent Wildlife Trust if these were being built as part of their forest school activities. No someone is coming into the woodlands and making them with no connection to our activities. There are scores of these in the woodland. I have also noticed someone is creating tree arches where ever suitable trees are growing, these spanning across the patheways. Made by bending the trees towards each other and twisting the branches together (like what you do with two ends of wire rto stop them coming apart). There are scores of these all over the place as well.
I have been collecting sticks painting them white with the intention of making some of these ‘dens’ on a small scale.
