A woodland ( / ˈ w ʊ d l ə n d / ) is, in the broad sense, land covered with woody plants ( trees and shrubs ), or in a narrow sense, synonymous with wood (or in the U.S., the plurale tantum woods ), a low-density forest forming open habitats with plenty of sunlight and limited shade (see differences between British , American and Australian English explained below). Some savannas may also be woodlands, such as savanna woodland , where trees and shrubs form a light canopy .
20-681: The Woodland Trust is the largest woodland conservation charity in the United Kingdom and is concerned with the creation, protection, and restoration of native woodland heritage . It has planted over 50 million trees since 1972. The Woodland Trust has three aims: to protect ancient woodland which is rare, unique and irreplaceable, to promote the restoration of damaged ancient woodland, and to plant native trees and woods to benefit people and wildlife. The Woodland Trust maintains ownership of over 1,000 sites covering over 24,700 hectares (247 square kilometres; 95 square miles)Of this, 8,070ha (33%)
40-594: A largely closed canopy that provides extensive and nearly continuous shade are often referred to as forests . Extensive efforts by conservationist groups have been made to preserve woodlands from urbanization and agriculture . For example, the woodlands of Northwest Indiana have been preserved as part of the Indiana Dunes . Woodland is used in British woodland management to mean tree-covered areas which arose naturally and which are then managed. At
60-667: A project commemorating the First World War involved tree planting and the establishment of new woodland sites across the UK. The planned sites were Langley Vale Wood (England), Dreghorn Woods (Scotland), Coed Ffos Las (Wales), and Brackfield Wood (Northern Ireland). As part of the project, the Woodland Trust entered a partnership with the National Football Museum to create team groves to commemorate all
80-570: A scheme called Woods on Your Doorstep. Its first employee and director, John James, came from Lincolnshire and was living in Nottingham at the time. It had a small office in Grantham , Lincolnshire. James was chief executive from 1992 to 1997, and then Michael Townsend from 1997 to 2004, Sue Holden from 2004 to 2014 and Beccy Speight from 2014 to 2019. The current chief executive is Darren Moorcroft. A new eco-friendly headquarters, adjacent to
100-595: Is ancient woodland. It ensures public access to its woods. The charity was founded in Devon , England in 1972 by retired farmer and agricultural machinery dealer Kenneth Watkins. The Trust's first purchase was part of the Avon Valley Woods, near Kingsbridge, Devon. By 1977 it had 22 woods in six counties. In 1978 it relocated to Grantham in Lincolnshire and announced an expansion of its activities across
120-543: Is estimated that compared to a concrete framed construction, the timber structure saved the equivalent in carbon production as nine years of the building's operation. The Woodland Trust's Head Office is located in Grantham in South Kesteven , south Lincolnshire , with regional offices across the UK. It employs around 300 people at its Grantham headquarters. Its current president is Clive Anderson since 2003. In 2016 Barbara Young, Baroness Young of Old Scone became
140-576: Is responding to the changing climate. The Trust's records date back to 1736, making it the longest written biological record of its kind. It has become a powerful tool in assessing the impact of climate change and is valued by research scientists. The Ancient Tree Inventory is a project run by the Woodland Trust in partnership with the Tree Register and the Ancient Tree Forum, which aims to record ancient, veteran and notable trees in
160-595: The National Forest and has twelve sites in Community Forests in England . The Woodland Trust also provides free trees to communities or places of education in order to facilitate the creation of new woodland. The Woodland Trust's Woods on Your Doorstep project created 250 "Millennium woods" to celebrate the millennium. As part of the trust's 'Tree For All' campaign, new woods were planted to mark
180-700: The Nature Detectives youth programme, a project for schools learning about the seasonal effect on woodlands – phenology – and the Ancient Tree Hunt campaign. It looks after more than 1,000 woods and groups of woods covering 190 square kilometres (73 sq mi). Nearly 350 of its sites contain ancient woodland of which 70 per cent is semi-natural ancient woodland – land which has been under tree cover since at least 1600. It also manages over 110 Sites of Special Scientific Interest . There are currently over 600 ancient woods under threat across
200-623: The last Ice Age (equivalent to the American term old-growth forest ) Woodlot is a closely related term in American forest management , which refers to a stand of trees generally used for firewood. While woodlots often technically have closed canopies, they are so small that light penetration from the edge makes them ecologically closer to woodland than forest. North American forests vary widely in their ecology and are greatly dependent on abiotic factors such as climate and elevation. Much of
220-849: The 2005 anniversary of the Battle of Trafalgar , notably Victory Wood in Kent. The Trust ran the Jubilee Woods project, which aimed to plant 6 million trees and create 60 commemorative 'Diamond' woods across the UK as part of Queen Elizabeth II 's Diamond Jubilee celebrations in 2012. The largest of these, owned and managed by the Trust itself, is the Flagship Diamond Wood within the National Forest in Leicestershire, which will be planted with 300,000 trees. Beginning in 2014,
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#1732772078116240-756: The Trust's Nature's Calendar project. As of 2016, the Woodland Trust had over 80 woods in Scotland, covering 21,000 acres (8,500 ha). In Wales, it acquired the 94 acres (38 ha) Coed Lletywalter in Snowdonia National Park in 1980. In 2016, it had over 100 woods in Wales. Work started in Northern Ireland in 1996 when the charity received a grant from the Millennium Commission to set up over 50 community woods in
260-623: The UK. The trust has also created new woodlands: over 32 km (12 sq mi) have been created, including 250 new community woods in England, Wales and Northern Ireland. Its largest current projects include the 41.7 km (16.1 sq mi) Glen Finglas Estate in the Trossachs , Scotland and the Heartwood Forest near St Albans , Hertfordshire , England, which will cover approximately 347 ha (860 acres). It owns 20 sites covering 4.3 km (1.7 sq mi) in
280-550: The UK. In 1984, Balmacaan Wood next to Loch Ness became the Trust's first Scottish acquisition. From 2005 to 2008 it co-operated with the BBC for their Springwatch programme and the BBC's Breathing Places series of events held at woods. It continues to work with Springwatch and Autumnwatch, most recently in 2015 as part of the Big Spring Watch, which encouraged viewers to record the signs of nature ( phenology ) through
300-490: The United Kingdom. As of 2022, over 180,000 trees have been recorded by members of the public on the project's website, which provides a map of the trees. Woods that the trust owns and looks after include: Woodland Woodlands may support an understory of shrubs and herbaceous plants including grasses . Woodland may form a transition to shrubland under drier conditions or during early stages of primary or secondary succession . Higher-density areas of trees with
320-601: The charity's Chair. The Woodland Trust receives funding from a wide range of sources including membership, legacies, donations and appeals, corporate supporters, grants and charitable trusts including lottery funding, other organisations and landfill tax. The Woodland Trust uses its experience and authority in conservation to influence others who are in a position to improve the future of native woodland. This includes government, other landowners, and like-minded organisations. It also campaigns to protect and save ancient woodland from destructive development. Its projects also include
340-404: The former offices, was completed in 2010 at a cost of £5.1million . The building, designed by Feilden Clegg Bradley Studios as architect and Atelier One as structural engineer, incorporates light shelves to distribute natural daylight around the 200 workstations, and concrete panels to absorb daytime heat, to provide the thermal mass that the lightweight wooden structure would otherwise lack. It
360-654: The old-growth deciduous and pine-dominated forests of the eastern United States was harvested for lumber, paper pulp, telephone poles, creosote, pitch, and tar. In Australia, a woodland is defined as an area with a sparse (10–30%) cover of trees, and an open woodland has a very sparse (<10%) cover. Woodlands are also subdivided into tall woodlands or low woodlands if their trees are over 30 m (98 ft) or under 10 m (33 ft) high, respectively. This contrasts with forests, which have more than 30% of their area covered by trees. Sites of Special Scientific Interest Too Many Requests If you report this error to
380-641: The professional football players involved in the First World War, giving supporters the chance to dedicate trees at the English Centenary Wood, Langley Vale in Epsom. This citizen science project encourages members of the public to record the signs of the seasons near to them in order to show and assess the impact of climate change on the UK's wildlife. Thousands of volunteers send in their sightings, providing evidence about how wildlife
400-516: The same time, forest is usually used in the British Isles to describe plantations , usually more extensive, or hunting Forests , which are a land use with a legal definition and may not be wooded at all. The term ancient woodland is used in British nature conservation to refer to any wooded land that has existed since 1600, and often (though not always) for thousands of years, since
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