I featured this ancient ash coppice stool in January.
It had been coppiced to regenerate new growth; a cycle of management that this tree may have been through perhaps a half a dozen times in its life. It attracted my interest because on one of the freshly cut faces of the stump, a member of the public had written with a marker pen:
“This was one our best loved trees. We are sad that you have cut it down” Read more …
I returned to the coppice stool last week, to search for the new growth that I had predicted so confidently in my defense of woodland management.
I was pleased, and secretly relieved, to discover its restoration to life: several tiny sprouts were emerging from the gnarled and hollow coppice stool. See the photo below. Let’s pray that the deer allow these shoots to grow.
Gabriel Hemery
