Courses

Why Manage Woodland?

Woodland is wonderful for its own sake. However, we can have the benefits of healthy ecosystems and beautiful landscapes in productive forestry. Unfortunately, much of our native broadleaf woodland is undermanaged, damaged by grey squirrels and prevented from regeneration by grazing pressure from livestock and deer. We are looking forward to helping you develop your ideas and skills for managing your woodland brilliantly!

2024 Course Summary

Royal Forestry Society

Managing Broadleaf for Timber June 8th

We run this 1 day course on behalf of the RFS

Contact RFS to reserve a place £75 RFS members/£95 non-members

Students with RFS membership can apply for the Spencer Bursary to attend this course.

Broadleaf Wales

Managing Small Woodlands June 29 and September 21

Practical Woodland Tasks June 30 and September 22

Grey Squirrel Control Please contact us to arrange a day course.

These courses are designed to give practical support to small woodland owners. They are also suitable for prospective woodland owners or woodland advisors/contractors who would like a better understanding of managing complex woodlands for multiple benefits.

All Courses £60. Current Bangor University/Glynllifon/Llysfasi Forestry students £30 (please send a photo of your student card).

Attend the Managing Small Woodlands and Practical Woodland Tasks on the same weekend for £100 – Highly Recommended!

Alternative dates available on request if you can arrange at least 4 participants.

Managing Small Woodlands and Practical Woodland Tasks

Managing Small Woodlands 2024

Growing broadleaf for timber and biodiversity

June 29th and September 21st £60

Yes! Broadleaf woodland can be managed to produce beautiful native hardwood timbers and support our native biodiversity. Join us for a day discussing Managing Small Woodlands where we will consider the different benefits we can get from woodland and how to target what we do when working in the woodland in order to achieve them. We will identify threats to woodland and develop ideas about how to address these. We will discuss felling licences and the law regarding habitat and species protection.

Practical Woodland Tasks 2024

June 30th and September 22nd £60

Timely guard removal

To get some hands-on experience to set you off on your woodland management journey with confidence, stick around for a second day getting to grips with Practical Woodland Tasks. We will do as many tasks as possible, which may include tree planting, aftercare of newly planted trees, respacing and formative pruning in young woodland, high pruning of more mature trees, coppicing hazel using hand tools, using simple equipment to extract timber.

Attend both courses on the same weekend for £100

Please Contact Us to book.

Grey Squirrel Control (Not Accredited)

Grey Squirrel Control

Multi-catch live trapping

This course is run at our woodland at Bron Haul and as it is not assessed, is cheaper than the accredited course. This is the perfect course if you want to control squirrels in your own garden or woodland. Most of the day will be spent walking through the woodland at Bron Haul, undertaking grey squirrel control whilst discussing the reasons for controlling greys and being immersed in our demonstration of the wonderfully healthy, productive native woodland we can have if we are successful. You will be made aware of the law regarding grey squirrel control and special considerations in areas with red squirrels. Discover the work of the UK Squirrel Accord. You will leave confident of your knowledge and ability to control grey squirrels safely, effectively and legally.

Please Contact Us to book.

Lantra Accredited Grey Squirrel Management Course

£260 1 participant £150 2 participants £120 3 participants £100 4 or more participants

Whether you wish to protect your young trees from damage or be part of expanding red squirrel habitat, this brand new British Red Squirrel course is a must! The Lantra accredited course covers squirrel ecology, reasons for management, law, working together, health and safety plus a theory and practical assessment. You will be made aware of the work of the UK Squirrel Accord. Your instructor, David Brown, will support you to leave with the knowledge and confidence to protect woodland and red squirrels from greys and your award will demonstrate competence to woodland owners. Contact us to organise dates.

In their report ‘Bringing Woodland into Management: the missed opportunities in England and Wales (1999) the Royal Forestry Society summarised their assessment of undermanagement of woodland as ‘…not only a wasted economic opportunity, it is a lost chance to increase carbon capture and storage and improve biodiversity; it is also undermining the health and resilience of these woodlands, making it more likely that eventually they will become derelict.’

The greatest threat to our native woodland is the American grey squirrel. The Royal Forestry Society released two reports in 2021 assessing the economic cost of grey squirrel damage and collating the responses of survey respondents to questions of their experience of grey squirrel impacts and control. 39 partnership organisations, including many of our most well-known and loved conservation charities, are working together under the UK Squirrel Accord to provide a landscape scale solution to the grey squirrel, whilst dedicated activists are working in their local groups to protect red squirrels against greys across the country under the banner British Red Squirrel. The move to recover the health of our woodland ecosystems from this non-native invasive is well underway. Are you ready to join?

By applying appropriate management, we have the choice to instead create a healthy and productive native woodland resource for the benefit of ourselves and future generations.