Wychwood Forest Trust Magazine Spring 2023

WYCHWOOD FOREST TRUST MAGAZINE

Spring 2023

It is snowing as I write this, but the snowdrops and primroses are out and the days are getting longer. Here at WFT, we are looking forward to the year ahead with a definite spring in our step.

With so many exciting plans for 2023, we are devoting a large part of this issue to our newest acquisition, Gibbets Close Hill. Our CEO Neil Clennell writes about the potential to explore different approaches to habitat restoration and wildlife management on this 50-acre reserve. He also considers the merits – or otherwise – of large-scale tree planting as a method for renaturalising sites like Gibbetts Close Hill.

David Rolfe, an ornithologist and experienced volunteer surveyor with the British Trust for Ornithology, was kind enough to carry out a breeding bird survey at Gibbetts Close Hill last year. He reports the encouraging results and discusses the wide variety of wildlife he came across.

Toby Swift, our Countryside and Reserves manager, explains how he and the volunteer work parties look after the reserves over the winter in preparation for the spring, with activities like coppicing, hedge laying and scrub bashing. There’s an interview with greenwood carver and WFT volunteer, David Knight, who tells us what it is like to help on our reserves and what the Wychwood area means to him. We also talk to international aid worker and local artist, Sarah Routley, about finding peace and inspiration in the Wychwood landscape.

We have already started planning this year’s Forest Fair, which will be held at Foxburrow on 9th July... so put the date in your diary! We look forward to seeing you all then.

Maeve Bradbury, Editor

CONTENTS

3 INTRODUCING GIBBETS CLOSE HILL

6 ART IN THE WYCHWOOD

7 LAND MANAGEMENT

8 BIRD SURVEY AT GIBBETS CLOSE HILL

10 VOLUNTEER’S VOICE

12 PHOTO COMPETITION

WYCHWOOD FOREST FAIR

Save

Date — 9th July 2023

The Wychwood Forest Fair is held at Foxburrow Wood, Witney OX29 9UN

If you are a trader or food vendor interested in having a stall at the fair, or would like to volunteer to help on the day, please email info@wychwoodforesttrust.co.uk

Introducing Gibbets Close Hill

Neil Clennell

Inearly summer last year, we took the legal freehold on our newest land acquisition, Gibbets Close Hill.

Nestling between the southern edge of Witney and Eynsham Hall estate to the east, Gibbets Close Hill was a legacy gift from the late Michael Smith from whom WFT purchased our wonderful Grimes Mead nature reserve back in 2011. At 20 hectares (50 acres), our new land is more than twice the size of our popular Foxburrow Wood restoration site and presents us with a wealth of different possibilities.

In this article, we take a first look at the potential of our new land for habitat restoration and wildlife colonisation and consider the merits – or otherwise –of large-scale tree planting as a method for renaturalising sites like this one and others.

As a new addition to our landholdings, we are just beginning the process of gathering as much baseline information about the site as we can. This is so that we can continue to make informed decisions as we implement a long-term vision for restoration of the land. This of course includes botanical and

faunal surveys of what species live there already – it has been a joy to see barn owls, sparrowhawks and other raptors so frequently on our initial forays.

We will also be sampling soil chemistry, looking at LIDAR topographical data (a form of laser imaging), investigating hydrological flows, and researching historical maps to learn how the surrounding landscape has been modified by people in recent history. However, just by exploring the site and reading the obvious (and not so obvious) landscape features, much about Gibbets Close’s past history and future potential is already apparent.

We know that the land has been quite benignly treated agricultural grassland for many decades, but probably has a more distant history of low intensity mixed arable and livestock farming. The land profile of some of the fields suggests that they have been ploughed in the past, but probably not since just after the econd world war and there are several dilapidated sheds in the farmyard that were once the base for the Witney Land Army during the war. For semi-natural habitat restoration though, the land presents some interesting building blocks.

Photo: ©Neil Clennell

There remains a network of relatively species-rich hedgerows that connect both within the site and to the wider landscape, including to the parkland, plantations and ancient woodland fragments at Eynsham Hall, barely two fields distant. These hedgerows boast some amazing mature and veteran trees, which become incrementally larger further east towards the surviving old woodlands nearby. Given these tell-tale features and proximity to the surviving forest relic on an adjacent aristocratic estate, we suspect that Gibbets Close was probably cleared of original forest for agriculture very recently in ecological time.

temperate deciduous woodland, this process broadly follows a cline through rank grassland, emerging scrub, then dense scrub which protects the first germinating trees, young scrub-woodland and eventually a recognisably ‘woody’ woodland of ever increasing maturity. As well as leading to a climax community, this relatively rapid and dynamic transition, known as natural succession, has a huge but often overlooked benefit for biodiversity. Entire communities of animals, from invertebrates to birds, which specialise in exploiting the various but temporary niches that those early stages of succession provide, come and go as the changing habitat becomes more and then less suitable for them. Well-known and romanticised creatures like nightingales and turtle doves naturally favour maturing scrubland mosaics yet are all but extinct in our region, in large part due to a significant lack of any meaningful expanses of primary habitat.

Gibbets Close — to plant, or not to plant?

So what do we plan to do with our latest acquisition? To us, this seems a near-perfect opportunity to test some commonly held beliefs about the best way to restore natural woodland and mosaic habitats on former agricultural land within highly populated, human-modified landscapes. The new reserve is close to an urban area, is loosely constrained on several sides by the fragmenting effects of main roads and is immediately recognisable as ‘farmland’ to a lay observer. However, it also has those more cryptic ecological ‘starting points’ described above. So, is this an opportunity to plant many acres of native sapling trees in order to help tackle the intertwined climate and biodiversity crises? We don’t think so for Gibbets Close.

Reaching for the whips and spiral guards and actively planting expanses of ex-agricultural or municipal land is all too often still the go-to approach for carbon capture and ‘nature recovery’. Yet have you ever stopped to wonder who planted the woods in the days before enthusiastic landowners and enticing grant schemes? Nature reclaiming land cleared or degraded by human activity is a process that happens at different speeds depending on many local factors, but it is an inevitable one.

In Britain, where in most physical conditions our eventual habitat type or ‘climax community’ is

Often well-meaning attempts to restore degraded land for biodiversity by large-scale tree planting generally bypass these transient early successional stages, usually because of an entirely understandable desire to see a quick result for effort – a recognisable woodland. However, further evidence is emerging all the time to suggest that in many situations, a less planned, more nature-led approach to woodland restoration can pay greater dividends for both carbon storage and biodiversity gain in the short and long terms.

The structural benefits of natural succession derived woodland

The UK Centre for Ecology and Hydrology recently published the results of the effects of natural succession, or ‘passive rewilding’ as they called it, on two abandoned agricultural fields adjacent to Monks Wood National Nature Reserve (NNR) near Cambridge. The two fields were taken out of agricultural use and then left unmanaged, one 60 and the other 25 years ago.

Without any direct intervention or management, and notably without any deer or squirrel control measures, they found that recolonisation was rapid, with the more recently abandoned field exceeding 85% woody vegetation cover with an average height of 3m in a little more than 20 years. By this time, the longer abandoned plot had 100% woody vegetation cover with an average canopy height of 13m, and was similar in structure to the ancient woodland of the adjacent NNR.

The two fields had a (naturally germinated) tree density of 132/ha and 390/ha respectively. Kew Gardens also recently entered the debate,

So, is this an opportunity to plant many acres of native sapling trees in order to help tackle the intertwined climate and biodiversity crises?

We don’t think so for Gibbets Close.

Photo ©Julia Bracewell

publishing the results of extensive global research as their ‘ten golden rules’ for reforestation to optimise carbon sequestration, biodiversity recovery and human livelihood benefits. One of these golden rules is to ‘use natural regeneration wherever possible’.

Is large-scale tree planting a failure of conservation?

Oliver Rackham, the revered woodland ecologist, argued that ‘tree planting is not synonymous with conservation…’, but rather that it is ‘…an admission that conservation has failed.’ So what about Foxburrow Wood, our first large-scale woodland restoration site? A little more than a decade ago, that reserve was itself a new acquisition of former agricultural land and WFT set out a plan to restore the land for people and nature. With the invaluable support and encouragement of local communities, we planted nearly 11,000 sapling trees across about half of the site. Was that the wrong approach?

Well, the survival rate of the trees has been incredibly high and ten years on, now that all of the spiral guards and stakes have been removed, Foxburrow Wood is starting to look and feel much more like the wilder place that was envisaged. It is also much loved by ourselves and by its many regular visitors. However, what really started to transform the biodiversity value of Foxburrow Wood in a very short space of time was not the habitat provided by the planted trees themselves, but rather the abandonment of any further significant ongoing management four years ago.

Before then the unplanted grassland areas were regularly mown to keep the developing nature reserve looking ‘neat and tidy’ but since then, the grassland quickly became rank and tussocky, and there was a rapid proliferation of butterfly species like marbled white and meadow brown whose larvae feed on those common grasses. Thistles, teasels and other ‘weed’ species were allowed to take their place in early succession, encouraging charms of goldfinches and other seed-eating birds back onto the land. The following year under the increasingly rank grassland cover, the voles and shrews recolonised, followed quickly by the owls and weasels that hunt them.

A different restoration approach for Gibbets Close?

Returning to those local factors that affect the rate at which natural succession towards a climax community woodland occurs, there is one fundamental difference between Foxburrow Wood and Gibbets Close as potential blank canvasses

for habitat restoration projects – the proximity to an abundant natural seed source. Gibbets Close has those mature tree species within its hedgerow network and boundary features, and is very close to both ancient and replanted woodland fragments. In just two seasons since the last agricultural haymaking and aftermath cattle grazing took place at Gibbets Close, we have started to see many small oak seedlings appear across the land. These are noticeable close to the canopy spread of the existing trees where acorns may have passively fallen and germinated, but also much further out in open ground where nature’s tree planters like squirrels and jays have been busy caching them for another day. They have probably always been doing this at Gibbets Close, but the results of their efforts suddenly become very apparent when the mowing and grazing of the land ceases.

By contrast, Foxburrow Wood has only one single mature tree within its boundary and sits within an immediate landscape all but denuded of copses and large specimen trees. Planting half of the land at the outset has accelerated the process of reforestation in circumstances where pioneer trees would naturally take longer to establish than they will at Gibbets Close. Of course, the trees would arrive at sites as unpromising as Foxburrow Wood in relatively little ecological time anyway, and there are strong arguments to be made for allowing that to happen too, but the project plan for Foxburrow Wood to date has also achieved a certain set of desired results beyond just strictly biodiversity recolonisation. And fortuitously perhaps, the method of habitat repair used at Foxburrow Wood now provides us with an experimental control with which to compare alternatives.

So the more we come to know Gibbets Close Hill, the more we see the opportunities for an alternative and experimental approach to natural succession-led woodland restoration. The concept of ‘passive rewilding’ has become less radical than it used to be in the biological conservation world in recent years, but there are still very, very few good examples of well researched and scientifically monitored trials, particularly on medium-sized ex-agricultural sites in England. As we continue to develop and refine our plans, we will keep our supporters informed and involved at every step, but we hope our initial thinking has stirred your interest. If you want to know more, or would like to discuss any of the ideas in this article in more detail with us, then please do sign up to one of the guided walks we have planned at Gibbets Close in the coming months. It really is worth exploring.

ART Wychwood in the

Oxfordshire feels very much like home to me – and somewhat of an escape.

I’m an aid worker and before I moved to the Wychwood Forest area, I lived in many different places, always travelling with my job. It’s important to me to come back to somewhere peaceful and safe. The countryside here feels gentle, restful and calm. When I’m away, it is often in very warm places where we tend to live mostly outside – so fresh air and nature always feel like a tonic to me. I love a sense of space and far-reaching views. The comparatively lush green of Oxfordshire is a real contrast to many of the hot dry places I have lived and worked in.

I definitely panicked at the beginning of lockdown with the idea of being trapped here without travel. It was the longest I hadn’t been on a plane for some time, but I quickly established a routine of walking each day with Dudley, my black Labrador, and I started to sketch and create ink and watercolour paintings of these walks. Many of my paintings are

from the Wychwood – the area around Swinbrook, Shorthampton and Ditchley.

My art has definitely been a place of rest and healing for me over the last few years. I paint most days and find that it’s an escape from what’s buzzing around my head and the pressure of work deadlines. I find the discipline important when I’m not working or am on my own. It totally absorbs my mind and I think of little else. I am often disturbed after many hours of painting only when my son comes in from school, or the fire burns out late at night. I have given up listening to podcasts and audio books whilst painting, as I have to keep repeating chapters!

I’m totally inspired by the local countryside and my travels. I love the shapes and lines, particularly of the trees and fields in different seasons – the dark trees and ploughed ridges against the greens and the yellows of the crops. There are some views and walks that I paint time and time again in different seasons and lights.

Sarah is on Instagram at @sarahroutleyinc

The Wychwood landscape inspires local artist, Sarah Routley.

Land Management

TobySwift describes spring preparations at our nature reserves in the Wychwood

Coppicing

Autumn and winter are the times for coppicing. The trees are in a state of dormancy – the sap is no longer running through them, the leaves have dropped, and the fruits and berries have been eaten or stored by various birds and other animals. That’s when we can coppice. Coppicing is the age-old management of timber that involves cutting trees close to the ground and then allowing them to regrow. We don’t want to do it when the tree is trying to grow or the wildlife is breeding and nesting.

Most tree species can be coppiced, but not all are. Oak is usually left to become a big timber tree that can be turned into building products like beams or support timbers. Beech is often left too and used for furniture as it is straight grained. One of the

reasons that the Chilterns are covered in beech is because it was used by the ‘bodgers’ in the local furniture industry at High Wycombe.

Traditionally in Britain, the most common coppice species are hazel, ash, willow, field maple, hornbeam and sweet chestnut. The range of products that come from managed coppice woodlands include fencing, carved and turned items, baskets, cogs and wooden screws. Coppicing has been going on for a long time – some of the timber used in ancient pathways in Somerset dates from c.3500 BC and has been identified as coppiced lime.

A side product of coppicing is the opening up of the woodland. With the removal of the coppice material, more light gets in to the woodland floor and encourages the growth of plants, which in turn provide valuable food sources for a variety of insects, birds and mammals. This rich ecosystem is protected by a continuing coppice cycle. In a more natural system, openings in the canopy would be as a result of tree fall but the outcome would be much the same.

Hedgelaying

Hedgelaying has to occur in the autumn and winter to avoid the active nesting season – any time between 31 August until 1 March. As a land management tool, hedgelaying creates boundary markers or containment structures for animals. A well laid, thick hedge will keep in sheep, cows and horses quite successfully and has the added bonus of being good for wildlife. They provide sites for nesting, small mammals can use the thick base and insects have a range of niches to occupy. Most tree and shrub species can be laid – if in doubt, try it!

Scrub bashing

Clearing the overgrown plants from pathways is a regular winter job and brambles, nettles, blackthorn and others do occasionally need a cut back. If possible, we leave them to follow their natural course, but if they are encroaching onto pathways or smothering an area, it doesn’t hurt to cut down and remove them. In the case of brambles, it will actually reinvigorate them! New stems will shoot and become covered in flowers in the spring and summer and fruits in the autumn.

Regular coppicing results in multi-stemmed trees with a longer lifespan and an increased range of habitats for species such as dormouse.

Bird Survey at Gibbets Close Hill David

Rolfe

Duringthe spring of 2022, I carried out a breeding bird survey for the Wychwood Forest Trust at Gibbets Close Hill.

The site is approximately 50 acres of permanent grassland, divided into four fields and a small farmyard. The land has been grassland for many years and used for raising cattle and producing hay – though for the last couple of years it has been left unmanaged. There is a small pond in one of the lower areas and several small boggy areas elsewhere. In the main, the fields are bounded by untrimmed hedgerows of hawthorn and blackthorn with mature oaks and ash. In the more open areas, patches of brambles thrive. Along some of the hedgerows on higher ground, there are rows of mainly dead elms up to 10m in height.

The purpose of the survey

The purpose is to determine the numbers of pairs of each bird species breeding on the site. This information is then used as baseline data for comparison with any future survey results.

The survey was based on the national Common Bird Census (CBC) overseen by the British Trust for Ornithology. Observations of wild birds’ typical breeding behaviour were recorded, plotted on maps for each species and then clusters of records converted into territories.

Territory mapping

Ten early morning visits are made to a site between mid-March and mid-June. The bulk of birds will be in hedgerows, so it is necessary to walk along those, as well as site boundaries. Many bird species nest and raise young in a defended area so the unit of measurement is the number of territories occupied by a species pair. The most obvious way a territory is proclaimed is by a singing male, but other indications such as a pair observed in a suitable nesting habitat, a bird giving warning calls and other agitated behaviour, nest building, an adult carrying a faecal sac or food for young, or a nest with young seen or heard, are also good examples. However, there are standard rules that

need to be complied with for a location to be confirmed as a territory, such as the number of visits on which breeding behaviour is seen there.

Survey results

The weather during the first couple of months was mainly dry, but winds were primarily from the northeast with cold nights and frosts, delaying the arrival here of wild birds migrating through Iberia from Africa, possibly in lower numbers than usual.

Seventeen species were found to have bred at Gibbets Close, with a further eight species possibly having done so. Wrens had the largest number of territories at 11, followed by blue tit and blackcap each with five, and song thrush with three. Each of great-spotted woodpecker, lesser whitethroat and yellowhammer had one territory.

During one visit, two families of great-spotted woodpecker were seen simultaneously feeding in dead elm trees. A little later, a green woodpecker family was seen doing the same.

Prior to carrying out the survey, I drew up a list of 42 different bird species expected to be seen on the site, and at the end of the last visit I had seen 39 of them. Species on the list not seen were hobby and, surprisingly, collared dove and rook. During my last visit for the survey, a charm of around forty goldfinches was constantly feeding on large expanses of thistles.

Other bird species noted, mostly coming from adjacent areas searching for food or on migration resting and feeding, included: red-legged partridge, black-headed gull, lesser black-backed gull, red kite, buzzard, kestrel, swift. jay, skylark, swallow and house martin.

Mammal species seen included roe deer, Reeves muntjac deer and rabbit. During a May visit, a doe roe deer barked loudly and dog-like continuously at me for at least ten minutes. She must have had a fawn nearby to protect and followed me at a distance until I approached the farmyard. After that, she must have accepted me because during following visits she just kept an eye from a distance.

Widely Used Standard Methods for counting birds

Several standardised methods for counting wild birds have been devised over the years. Although very time consuming, the Territory Mapping method was chosen for this site because it was thought the most suitable one for the configuration of the site and to provide an accurate result.

Atlas Population Counts are random walks, usually over a tetrad (2km x 2km), to note all birds seen and their activities, as a guide to whether they’re breeding or over-wintering. It is used nationally and locally for county and bird club reports.

Point Counts, such as the national Wetland Bird Counts, are often used for the regular listing and counting of species such as wildfowl, gulls and wading birds, usually from regular observation points.

Line Transects, such as the Breeding Bird Survey that is now the main national wild bird monitoring method, are carried out over a 1km square, and involve walking two parallel transects and noting bird activities in each 200m section at three distance belts. Results are then interpreted by scientists.

Territory Mapping is where a bird pair’s territory is plotted onto a map. It was originally devised to monitor wild farmland birds and, as the national Common Birds Census, was also used in open woodland and parkland. It was the UK’s main wild bird monitoring method from 1962 until the late 1990s and is still used.

Bird species breeding on site

pheasant, wood pigeon, great-spotted woodpecker, blue tit, great tit, chiffchaff, blackcap, lesser whitethroat, whitethroat, wren, song thrush, blackbird, robin, house sparrow, greenfinch, linnet

Bird species that possibly bred on site (but did not meet the criteria) green woodpecker, magpie, carrion crow, long-tailed tit, starling, dunnock, chaffinch, goldfinch

David Rolfe has carried out regular bird surveys for the British Trust for Ornithology for more than 30 years. He has also been the local RSPB bird-watching trips leader and the West Oxfordshire Field Club’s dawn chorus walks leader.

Wren ©Pexels-Erik-Karits

Volunteer’s Voice

What’s it like to volunteer for the WFT?

DavidKnight lives in Eynsham and has been a volunteer with WFT since 2020. We asked him why he does it.

How did you get involved with the Wychwood Forest Trust?

When my family moved to Oxfordshire in 2010, we attended the Wychwood Forest Fair for the first time and enjoyed it very much. We have been regular attenders and then demonstrators of greenwood carving ever since. I stepped down from a full-time role in 2020, and was then able to devote more time to volunteering. I was very pleased to support the Wychwood Forest Trust as my closest environmental charity.

How often do you volunteer and which activities do you get involved with?

I try to get out and support WFT around twice a month. When I first left full-time work, I joined the dry stone walling team. I want to thank them for taking on a complete walling rookie and giving me a flavour of this amazing country skill. I look in awe at the work they do across West Oxfordshire! Sadly, all walling came to an end in March 2020 when we went into the first Covid lockdown. Then, as restrictions eased, I got more involved at the reserve management end of volunteering, with sessions at Woodstock Water Meadows, Foxburrow Wood, Singe Wood and also at Gibbets Close.

I’ve spent most time at Foxburrow. When we are volunteering there, it is always uplifting to see the number of visitors to the site with two legs and four (and a furry tail!) Most recently, we’ve been coppicing hazel for stakes and binders that can be used for traditional hedgelaying.

Why is it important for you to volunteer with WFT?

I feel that I can give something back to the planet, however small, so that there are some oases of well-managed wild places where nature can thrive

in our developed and intensively farmed patch of Oxfordshire.

What do you ‘get back’ from volunteering with the WFT?

I learn so much from Toby and from my fellow volunteers at each session I attend that it really enhances my enjoyment of the natural environment. I also get some wonderful exercise in the fresh air and feel calmed and invigorated all at the same time. A good night’s sleep after all the physical activity is a real bonus, as is revisiting our work weeks and months afterwards to see the progress being made.

Do you volunteer with any other organisations?

I’m a trustee of the Wild Oxfordshire Charity which seeks to bring people and organisations together to protect biodiversity in the county, and works closely with the Wychwood Forest Trust. I also volunteer at Combe Mill Museum and Hill End Outdoor Education Centre in Farmoor.

How important is nature conservation to you?

Nature conservation is really important to me personally and grows more important as the links between climate breakdown and the world’s wild places gets stronger by the day. Every patch, however small, can contribute to capturing carbon, providing a haven for wildlife and lifting the spirits of us humans!

Tell us about your relationship with the Oxfordshire countryside. How does it compare to other places you’ve lived?

I moved from Northumberland to live in Oxfordshire and the topography, geology and climate are all quite different. Oxfordshire has a lot to offer with three protected landscapes of the Cotswolds, Chilterns and North Wessex Downs within its borders, but at the same time its proximity to London and the Oxford/Cambridge arc means development, housing density and land use is much more intensive.

Photo: ©Toby Swift

Although we have a lot of countryside in Oxfordshire, there is not the same ‘right to roam’ as there is in areas such the Cheviot Hills of Northumberland. With so much of Oxfordshire being farmed, I would love to see more regenerative agricultural practice in our county. I’m impressed with the work of FarmEd in the Cotswolds, showing how low-input agriculture can be both profitable and good for the environment.

What does the Wychwood Forest mean to you?

Having lived near the New Forest for many years, I can see in the landscape here the ghost of the royal hunting forest that Wychwood once was; a mix of woodland and open areas where game roamed freely and local laws protected the land to maximise the enjoyment of the hunt. We may not go hunting any more, but it is wonderful that we can still enjoy the fragments of the Wychwood Forest that are left under the stewardship of the Wychwood Forest Trust, and dream of a larger, more connected and joined-up patch of wild land in West Oxfordshire for wildlife (and humans) to seek tranquility and shelter.

What have been your highlights as a volunteer for the Wychwood Forest Trust?

I very much enjoy supporting the educational activities of the Wychwood Forest Trust and helped tutor the ‘Fire and Steel’ course for children at Foxburrow. It was such a joy to see the children roam across the site and collect natural materials for tinder to light a fire. And to see the look of concentration on their faces when we put a sharp knife in their hands and taught them how to carve locally collected hazel, safely and responsibly!

Thank you David for talking to us and for everything you do for the WFT as a volunteer!

If you’d like to get involved with the Wychwood Forest Trust like David, and help your local environment, call Toby on 07561 639094 or email us in the office at info@wychwoodforesttrust.co.uk

We run regular work parties at our sites and offer volunteering opportunities with our specialist flora, drystone walling, and hedgelaying groups.

We are also looking for volunteers to help out at events like the Wychwood Forest Fair. So if you are passionate about nature conservation and want to make a difference to your local area, we’d love to hear from you.

Call: 07561 639094

Email: info@wychwoodforesttrust.co.uk

Photo: ©David Knight

Wychwood Forest Trust

PHOTO COMPETITION

Win £150 to spend on photographic equipment

Theme: ‘My Wychwood’ Closing date: Midnight on 31st July 2023

First prize: a £150 voucher for photographic equipment

Second prize: a beautiful piece of wall art kindly donated by A Blackbird Sang

Third prize: a stunning hand-carved wooden bowl and spoon from local greenwood carver, David Knight

Two runners-up will win a wren garden ornament

The photos by twelve finalists will feature in the Wychwood Forest Trust 2024 calendar

Please read the rules before you submit your photographs

• Each entrant can submit up to three photos

• The competition is only open to amateur photographers

• Entries must not have won other national or international competitions

• You must be the sole author and owner of the copyright of all images entered into the competition

• By entering your image into the competition, you grant WFT the right to reproduce it with attribution but without compensation, for any purpose in the future, including publicity and publication

• Photographs must be submitted as jpegs no larger than 5MB, and must be landscape orientation

HOW TO ENTER

To submit, please send up to three images (as jpegs no larger than 5MB), with your name, address and phone number to maeve@wychwoodforesttrust.co.uk marked PHOTO COMPETITION in the subject line

THANKS

We are very grateful to Genny Early and Tony Davis of A Blackbird Sang, and David Knight for their generosity in supporting the Wychwood Forest Trust by donating prizes

CONTACT

Wychwood Forest Trust, Woodgreen, New Yatt Road, Witney OX28 1NB 07561 639093 l info@wychwoodforesttrust.co.uk

©Wychwood Forest Trust 2023 Registered charity no. 1084259

Cover photograph: Gibbets Close Hill ©Neil Clennell

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Photo: ©Matthew Jellings