Managing urban ancient woodlands: A case study of Bowden Housteads Wood, Sheffield

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Managing urban ancient woodlands: Acase study of Bowden Housteads Wood,SheffieldMelvyn Jones a & Ian D. Rotherham aa Sheffield Hallam University, Sheffield, UKPublished online: 15 Feb 2013.

To cite this article: Melvyn Jones & Ian D. Rotherham (2012): Managing urban ancient woodlands: Acase study of Bowden Housteads Wood, Sheffield, Arboricultural Journal: The International Journalof Urban Forestry, 34:4, 215-233

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Managing urban ancient woodlands: A case study of BowdenHousteads Wood, Sheffield

Melvyn Jones* and Ian D. Rotherham

Sheffield Hallam University, Sheffield, UK

Managing urban ancient woodland sustainably is problematic and furthermore, there isa lack of detailed, long-term case-study evidence. These issues are discussed withrespect to a particular case study site in Sheffield, England. This example is especiallyinformative due to the long timeline of the known site management. It also raisesserious issues for future management and the consequences of the processes ofurbanisation. Composition, structure and condition of the case-study wood, BowdenHousteads Wood, prior to management in early 1988, are placed in their historical andsocial contexts. When late twentieth-century management took place, it was the firstactive intervention on the site for over a century. The implementation of a series ofmanagement plans are then described covering the periods 1987–1991, 2000–2005and 2009–2013. Interpretation of vegetation condition and the monitoring of recoveryfollowing intervention demonstrated a remarkable ability of typical ancient woodlandflora to reappear. However, there are long-term issues of human encroachment onto thesite from nearby housing with the twin impacts of (1) introduction of exotic andpotentially invasive species, and (2) destruction of the last pockets of rare woodlandindicator plants. The paper emphasises that, in the late twentieth and early twenty-firstcenturies, managing public amenity woods in heavily populated urban areas is as muchabout public relations as it is about woodmanship and ecological principles.Furthermore, managing publicly owned amenity woodland is a long-term process andthis becomes problematic when public services are being rapidly eroded by nationalgovernmental policies. The paper reflects action research and observation withstakeholders over a 30-year period.

Keywords: urban woodland; ancient woodland; management plans; coppicing;selective thinning; group felling; public relations

Introduction

This article is based on a conference paper presented to the Association of Applied

Biologists Conference in 2011(Jones & Rotherham, 2011). It represents the first published

review of work on this site since management was re-started in the 1980s, and addresses

issues raised by Rotherham (1991). The approach to the site and its conservation was

strongly influenced by the Sheffield Nature Conservation Strategy (Bownes, Riley,

Rotherham, & Vincent, 1991) and the proactive response to environmental issues being

promoted at the time through the Sheffield City Council Countryside Management

Service. Throughout the 1980s and 1990s, this site was also used as a case study for

teaching purposes at the two Sheffield universities, and also on national training courses on

woodland management and countryside management run from the then Peak Park Study

Centre at Losehill Hall in Derbyshire. There were frequent requests from participants on

the course for this unique case study to be written up and made available. The paper

reports on and to some extent reflects, processes of public authority intervention in the

q 2012 Taylor & Francis and Aboricultural Association

*Corresponding author. Email: [email protected]

Arboricultural Journal: The International Journal of Urban Forestry, 2012

Vol. 34, No. 4, 215–233, http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/03071375.2012.767075

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woodland resource. The earliest activities were supported by the Countryside Commission

(later the Countryside Agency), and the City Council’s own Woodland Team and

Countryside Management Services, the latest phases being driven by support from bodies

such as South Yorkshire Forest Partnership. Furthermore, the work and the findings of this

pioneering experiment on managing urban ancient woodland were widely disseminated at

national training events organised by Losehill Hall and funded by the Countryside

Commission. None of these organisations remains intact or active in such works today and

the implications of these losses are largely unrecognised (see Rotherham, 2010). Also and

often unrecognised, the two regional universities are no longer actively involved or

supportive of work or study relating to sites such as these. In the 1980s and 1990s,

seconded staff, were available, free of charge, to help lead and guide the cutting-edge

research, which in many ways triggered the events and site management of the last

30 years. This would not be allowed today.

There are upwards of 80 ancient woods or fragments of ancient woods within

Sheffield’s city boundaries, including one, Ecclesall Woods, of nearly 120 ha within

a quarter of an hour’s bus or car journey of the city centre. Moreover, the residents and

visitors are always aware of the woods in the landscape even though they only cover

a small fraction of the area. They cover the scarps and back slopes of the highest edges,

and on lower ground, they hang on steep valley sides right into the heart of the urban area.

It has been estimated that 44% of Sheffield’s 538,000 residents live within a five-minute

walk of a wood. How many other cities can match these statistics? The answer is none.

Sheffield is the best-wooded city in the country.

Bowden Housteads, the subject of this paper, is one of Sheffield’s surviving ancient

woods. Unusual for an ancient wood of this size (it covers 31.7 ha), is that it has survived

in Sheffield’s inner city. It lies just over two miles (c.4 km) east of the city centre and is

completely surrounded by urban development (Figure 1). An ancient wood is one that is

known from documentary evidence or from a combination of archaeological, botanical

and geographical evidence to have already been in existence at some critical threshold date

in the past: George Peterken suggests AD 1600 (Peterken, 1981) and Oliver Rackham, AD

1700 (Rackham, 1980). The significance of these dates is that it was only after the end of

the seventeenth century that there was large-scale planting of trees in England to form

woods. This means that any wood already in existence by 1700 would almost certainly

have been the descendant of a medieval working wood, an area of woodland conserved,

named and managed. This was not wildwood, not natural woodland, but semi-natural

woodland, influenced by human activity over hundreds and in some cases over thousands

of years. These woods have the greatest heritage value. It is the inherited characteristics of

ancient woods: their sites, locations, shapes, variety of plant life and fauna, their

archaeology and often long documented history, which make them so special. They take us

back to the roots of our history and are irreplaceable. The approach to identification and

assessment of such ancient woods has been developed considerably in recent years (see, for

example Rotherham, 2011 and Jones, 2012).

Yet, for almost a century, until the late 1980s, the publicly owned, ancient, broadleaved

woods in the City of Sheffield were in serious decline. They were mostly neglected and

unmanaged, or in a few cases intensively over-managed as recreation sites. This absence of

intervention was evident except where dead or dying trees were judged a danger to the

public. The benign neglect of the woods made them much less attractive than in the past;

increasingly even-aged with dense canopies and poorly developed shrub layers. They

contained much poorer displays of spring flowers; some breeding birds and butterflies,

which were once common, were reduced in number, or no longer found. Local residents

216 M. Jones and I.D. Rotherham

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were increasingly afraid of walking in the woods because they were dark and gloomy and

engendered a fear of personal attack. The more accessible woods were sometimes heavily

vandalised and full of litter. After having survived for hundreds, and in some cases for

thousands, of years, there was a real danger that Sheffield’s woodland heritage would be

squandered. Our ancestors quite deliberately protected the woods by actively managing

them. The twentieth-century attitude in urban areas seemed to have been, at best, to let them

take care of themselves, and at worst, to abuse them unmercifully.

However, in 1962, a major storm event, known locally as “The Great Gale”, struck the

city and along with the destruction of houses, also punched holes into woodland canopies

in woods across the area. At the same time, the introduced disease myxomatosis had

decimated local rabbit populations, and the region lacked any significant populations of

wild deer (Rotherham & Derbyshire, 2012). The consequence of the extreme weather

event and the lack of grazing and browsing herbivores in the woods resulted in rapid and

dramatic regeneration cores of birch and oak in woods across the region, perhaps for the

Figure 1. Bowden Housteads Wood.

Arboricultural Journal: The International Journal of Urban Forestry 217

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first time for a hundred years. By the 1970s, the evidence of the power of natural

regeneration in these woods was becoming obvious. Undoubtedly, this observation

influenced the approaches of pioneering urban ecologist Oliver Gilbert. His ideas

(see below), had a major influence on woodland management here and elsewhere.

Since 1986, a succession of policies, projects and the implementation of a series of

integrated management plans have attempted to alleviate the management problems in

Sheffield’s ancient woodlands. This paper uses Bowden Housteads Wood as a case study

to highlight management issues in urban ancient woodlands and illustrate how they were

tackled in this particular wood over the last 30 years. There remain deep-seated problems

of long-term hydrological and ecological decline for the site and current, early twenty-first

century austerity and resultant cuts in local authority services exacerbate the issues.

Furthermore, over the period, local developments have taken place with new mega-stores

and other urban buildings and roadways, and it seems that the planning process simply

fails to consider the woodland. Major re-developments have been allowed without any use

of sustainable drainage technologies or approaches. This means that the site is further

desiccated and the dewatering process gets worse by the year. A consequence of the site

de-watering and the “catchment theft” associated with local urban developments and

roadways, is the erosion of topsoil and the loss of areas of wet woodland. These changes

are exacerbated by ground flora shading by planted beech (now mature), and by the

historic stripping of turf, soil and vegetation for charcoal burning. The latter were used to

cover the charcoal clamps. The result of these changes is a hard-panned surface across

much of the wood and therefore a reduced capacity to hold back and to absorb rainfall.

Furthermore, the desiccation is made worse because rainfall flows off the woodland

surface and is not absorbed into the soil and bedrock as groundwater.

In addition, in 2007, Sheffield suffered its worst ever natural floods, and this site is

in the catchment that contributed to the inundation of the Lower Don Valley (Rotherham,

2008a, 2008b). Instead of holding water back, slowing the flow, and absorbing moisture

into the ground and in wet woodland, the eroded, desiccated site simply shed the

inundation back into the main watercourse and thus into the River Don. Whilst this poor

hydrological management of the 32-ha site was not the cause of the problem, this blase

attitude to landscape and water management certainly contributed to the flood and the

misery. Furthermore, the same processes are occurring in many other woods and green

spaces across the same catchment.

History of the site

A summary of the history of the site helps emphasise the nature of the resource that was in

danger of being heavily depleted and possibly lost altogether. Bowden Housteads Wood

lies in a typical ancient woodland location on an ancient parish boundary (between

Handsworth and Sheffield). Its shape is typical of ancient woodland sites, zigzagged in

places, sinuous in others, a reflection of the fact that it is the remnant of woodland clearing

over millennia. Its boundaries are marked by banks and ancient stone walls, or

a combination of the two. The wood was first mentioned in a document in May 1332

(Curtis, 1918), making it one of the earliest recorded ancient woods in Sheffield. The

document in which it was first recorded was an inquisition post mortem, i.e. a document

that was drawn up in medieval times at an inquest following the death of a large property

owner to record the size of his estate and to establish his rightful heir. It was the inquisition

of Thomas de Furnival, the lord of the manor of Hallamshire. In the inquest document,

the wood was simply Baldwynhoustead. Baldwin is an Anglo-Saxon personal name and


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Houstead is made up of two Anglo-Saxon elements hus meaning house and stede which

can mean a place, a building or a farm. The wood is therefore probably named after

a nearby farm whose tenant was called Baldwin when the name was given.

In the 1332 inquisition, Bowden Housteads Wood was recorded in a list of woods and

moorland as a pasture and this probably means that it was wood pasture. In a wood pasture

the lord of the manor’s and/or his tenants’ farm animals were allowed to graze at specified

times. Besides cattle and horses feeding on the grass, acorns would be a valuable food for

pigs during October (this was called pannage), new succulent holly would be cut for farm

stock (this was called leaf fodder), and bracken would be cut for animal bedding.

An important role of wood pastures was for the right of “estovers”. This was the right of

tenants to take wood and timber for building and repairing their farm buildings (called

housebote), for making and repairing farm equipment (ploughbote and cartbote), to erect

or repair hedges and fences (hedgebote or haybote) and for firewood (firebote).

As the population grew andwoodlandwas cleared for farming and the demand for timber

trees and underwood increased, a woodland supply crisis loomed.Manywood pastures were

fencedwith banks and ditches or stonewalls to keep grazing animals out andwere converted

into coppice woods. This is what happened to Bowden Housteads Wood in the late Middle

Ages. By the end of the sixteenth century, BowdenHousteadswas awell-established coppice

wood. It is included in a long list of woods compiled for the seventh Earl of Shrewsbury

whowasEarl between1590 and1616. Significantly, the listwas entitled “Abriefe estimate of

the springe woods belonging to his lordship’s forges . . . ” A “spring wood” in South

Yorkshire was invariably a coppice-with-standards. In such a wood, most of the trees were

cut back to ground level (coppiced) about every 20 years and they then grew back multi-

stemmed. Among the coppiced trees some trees were left to grow as single-stemmed trees

and these were the standards. The standards, which were mostly oaks, were used in building

projects. The fact that the spring woods were said to belong to the Earl’s forges suggests that

most of the coppice wood would be made into charcoal for smelting iron.

The wood was coppiced regularly for the next 300 years, and records in the nineteenth

century are very full. An 1810 map survives showing the wood divided into five

compartments. Information on themap includes the dates of themost recent falls suggesting

25-year coppice cycles. The map also gives the number of standards growing in each

compartment. A sales agreement for 1821 for one of the compartments itemises the timber

and coppice to be felled: 356 oak trees and 1051 oak poles, 15 ash poles, three alder poles

together with the “tops and underwood”. In 1838, there are full details of bark peelers at

work in the wood. This suggests it was still predominantly an oak wood (Quercus petraea)

as oak bark was the main constituent in the preparation of a liquor in which skins were

soaked to make them pliable for working.When the contracts were set with the bark peelers

the Duke of Norfolk’s wood agent paid for “ale for the bark peelers” to seal the bargain.

There then follow details of the “pilling” and “shaving” of the bark which was then stacked,

chopped, bagged and loaded on to carts to be taken to tanneries. Large fellings (called

“falls”) were recorded in 1864 and 1875–77 and the sales details again give the tree species

to be felled: in 1864 oak, ash, elm, willow, alder, maple, crab apple and larch. The mention

of larch strongly suggests substantial planting of this exotic conifer had taken place before

the mid-nineteenth century. Coppicing everywhere in South Yorkshire was in decline. This

is confirmed by theDuke ofNorfolk’s wood agent’s intention in 1898 to plant 25 acres in the

wood with oak, ash, birch, sycamore, sweet chestnut and lime eight feet apart and “filled up

with larch 4ft apart”. Bowden Housteads was becoming a plantation and this planting about

110 years ago is reflected in the substantial number of sweet chestnut (Castanea sativa)

and beech (Fagus sylvatica) in the wood.


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As noted above, the first mention of Bowden Housteads as a coppice wood was in a list

of woods belonging to the Earl of Shrewsbury’s forges. It would therefore be expected that

there should be charcoal-making sites in the wood where the charcoal stacks were made.

These were called pitsteads or charcoal hearths. There are many subtle variations in

charcoal hearth layout. Essentially, a level site was chosen and the turf removed, or, on a

steep site, a level area was dug out from the hillside. It was about 15 feet (c. 5m) in

diameter. Pitsteads are most difficult to identify when they are on naturally level ground,

although when the circular or oval sites have been reused over many coppice cycles they

are usually dish-shaped. Careful inspection to find blackened soil and small pieces of

charcoal may confirm the feature’s identity as a charcoal hearth. Although early surveys

had failed to locate any pits in the wood (see Ardron and Rotherham, 1999 for example),

a more thorough investigation in 2000 (Rotherham and Ardron, 2001), identified

numerous large charcoal hearths and associated features such as working areas

and trackways. Based on extensive field surveys across the region and nationally, Ardron

and Rotherham (1999) provided a first typology for charcoal hearths in woods. Further

guidance on field identification is provided in the Woodland Heritage Manual

(Rotherham, Jones, Smith, & Handley, 2008). A Level 2 Archaeological Survey

conducted in the wood in 2001 by Northern Archaeological Associates as part of the

Fuelling a Revolution project (see below) confirmed the presence of 10 platform features

of which seven were believed to be charcoal-making sites, though this under-estimates

those confirmed by the earlier study. No doubt, there are others still to be formally

recorded. In terms of woodland management, the presence of archaeological sites provides

practical problems when felling and extraction of wood and timber are taking place.

The state of the wood on the eve of integrated management in 1988

In 1916, the Duke of Norfolk sold Bowden Housteads Wood to Sheffield Corporation for

£6000 for use as a place of recreation. Since then, not only was the site left virtually

unmanaged for more than 70 years, but also a large section of the wood was lost through

opencast coal mining in the 1940s. It was also bisected by the construction of the Sheffield

Parkway (A630) in 1970 and the southern part of the wood was further subdivided by the

creation of the Mosborough Parkway in 1990 (see Figure 1). The wood became

increasingly even-aged, with a dense canopy resulting from the closely planted trees,

especially in those areas dominated by beech, causing suppression of ground flora and

erosion of bare soils on steep slopes (Rotherham, 1996). Because it was gloomy and

monotonous it was much less attractive to insects, mammals and birds, and visitors felt

less safe walking there. Its ancient boundary walls were also in a state of great disrepair

and it was heavily littered in places (Figure 2). Furthermore, local householders made

incursions into the boundaries of the site and tipped their refuse directly over the vestiges

of the ancient woodland ground flora. A further potential problem that was largely

unrecognised at first was that the woodland was becoming drier. This was because the

water catchment had been significantly attenuated (Griffiths & Rotherham, 1996) and the

water table had fallen due to the large-scale urbanisation of the surrounding area. This had

a dramatic negative impact on the woodland’s ecology, and combined with heavy shade

from the maturing beech, led to loss of ground flora and soil. We estimate that in some

places 15–30cms of topsoil, and of course the seed-bank, was lost. The remaining areas of

native woodland ground flora were restricted to a few streamsides and to short stretches of

the woodland boundary, to give a halo or “Polo-Mint” effect of an impoverished core and

relicts of woodland indicators on the outer fringes. Even where surface water still entered


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the woodland through a number of small streams, these were regularly subject to serious

contamination due to inappropriate disposal of metalliferous waste from a local factory

and from disposal of used dye from the adjacent REMPLOY works. These problems were

difficult to resolve, until the personal intervention of local MP David Blunkett, whose then

home backed onto the wood.

Nevertheless, the wood was still a heavily used public open space. In June 1986, a user

survey of the wood was conducted among a random selection of adult respondents in 236

households living in those parts of Richmond, Handsworth, Darnall, Manor and

Woodthorpe lying adjacent to the wood (Jones, 1986a). In answer to the question “If you

visited a local wood which one would it be?”, 228 answered “Bowden Housteads”. Of

these 228 respondents 81% said they visited the wood on a daily, regular or occasional

basis. Forty-two said they visited the wood every day and 43 said they visited often. Of the

Figure 2. Sketch map of Bowden Housteads Wood compiled in1986 showing composition, specialhabitats and pressured areas.


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115 respondents who took walks there, 76 walked a dog, 29 explored with young members

of their family. Forty-two used it as a short cut. Eighty-seven of the users said that when

they visited the wood they went alone.

Among serious problems in the wood, respondents cited chopping down trees,

dumping rubbish, starting fires, using airguns and off-road motorbiking. The most serious

of these were reckoned to be dumping rubbish and motorbiking. At the end of the

questionnaire survey, respondents were asked to offer any other comments about the

wood. Complimentary comments included: “important for wildlife and relaxation”,

“somewhere quiet to go to get away from the traffic”, “tranquil – nice to have a green open

space in a built-up area”, “a precious place for children to go and come in contact with

nature”, “we need woodlands, need bits of green”, and “somewhere different to walk in

and the best thing in the area”. However, these were balanced by critical comments that

emphasised the lack of management such as: “once meant a lot; now it has deteriorated”,

“very dark and gloomy”, “wants cleaning up”, “an unsafe place to walk in or for children

to play in”, and “needs supervising by a ranger”.

Responses to questions concerning community involvement were generally

encouraging. Seventy-three per cent of those questioned said they thought it was a good

idea to organise public meetings at which city council officers would explain how the

wood might be managed and at which local residents could obtain information and offer

their own views. Seventy-five per cent of those questioned supported the idea of forming

a “Friends of Bowden Housteads” group to organise such activities as clean-up campaigns

and guided walks. In addition, 41% of these supporters of the idea said they would actively

take part in the activities of such a group.

This then was the situation after nearly three-quarters of a century of public ownership

and benign neglect. A large majority of local residents still cherished and used Bowden

Housteads, but it was in great need of sympathetic management.

Renewed management: Phase 1, the 1980s

The wood saw a marked turn for the better in the 1980s. At this time, the wood, like many

others across the region, was not recognised as being “ancient”. In 1979, following

observations of woodland regeneration in natural glades from the Great Gale, a small

number of experimental glades were created under the supervision of Dr Oliver Gilbert of

the University of Sheffield (Gilbert, 1982) to demonstrate the speed and variety of

regeneration by trees, shrubs and ground flora when group felling took place. The rapidity

of regrowth assured those members of the Council staff and local councillors who were

sceptical about such management and fearful of the critical reaction of local residents.

Their concerns followed attempts to manage another wood by selective thinning which

generated huge local opposition. Local users, up in arms, called the operations “a wildlife

catastrophe of major proportions” going on to say that once the wood came to the attention

of Sheffield City Council’s Countryside Management Service “the wood was doomed”. In

the first, small (0.5 ha) demonstration clearing in Bowden Housteads, bluebell flower

numbers increased, from around 20 to 1500 þ by year six. From then on until year 11,

when monitoring finished, they declined as shrubs and trees closed the successional

canopy (Figure 3). Other species from the seed-bank appeared: bramble (Rubus fruticosus

agg.), common figwort (Scrophularai nodosa), St John’s wort (Hypericum pulchrum),

toadrush (Juncus bufonius), soft rush (Juncus effusus) and wood sedge (Carex sylvaticus).

Windblown seed brought goat willow (Salix caprea), rosebay willowherb (Chamerion

angustifolium), marsh thistle (Cirsium palustre) and coltsfoot (Tussilago farfara).


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In order to “beautify” the glade, foxglove (Digitalis purpurea) was introduced as seed and

it established well.

In 1986, one of the authors (MJ) was seconded to Sheffield City Council to carry out two

research projects; the other was now City Ecologist (IDR). One of the research projects was

to identify those woods in Council ownership that were ancient woods, use archive research

to record their history, and to write detailed biographies of each wood (Jones, 1986b). This

was the first time that Bowden Housteads was confirmed as ancient. In that study 31 ancient

woods were identified, 29 more than previously acknowledged. In a follow-up study later

the same year, 45 ancient woods were identified in Sheffield (Jones, 1986c). The second

research project was a series of household surveys around Ecclesall Woods, the Gleadless

Valleywoods, andBowdenHousteadsWood as already noted. Both research projects added

to the desire for interventionist management in Bowden Housteads. In addition, whilst

Oliver Gilbert’s research on the woods had ended prematurely following the departure of

a part-finished PhD project worker, the vegetation monitoring was continued by the other

author (IDR), and this eventually resulted in a detailed account of the state of the woodland

flora (Milego, Hobson, & Rotherham, 1995).

Figure 3. One of Oliver Gilbert’s experimental glades in Bowden Housteads Wood, c. 1990. Theregeneration was then 10 years old.


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Further impetus came from the adoption by the City Council in 1987 of a Woodland

Policy (Sheffield City Council, 1987a). The policy document acknowledged that the city’s

ancient woodlands were fragile, under great threat and that the Council was “both failing

to conserve our woodland heritage and to make the most of what is a valuable asset”. The

primary aim of the Woodland Policy therefore was “to ensure the protection and

perpetuation of woodlands within the city and to realise their full potential in as many

ways as possible”. There then followed 11 objectives including:

to conserve woodlands in perpetuity in a healthy state,

to protect, conserve and encourage all forms of indigenous wildlife,

to maintain and preserve historic and archaeological features,

to manage the woodlands using sound silvicultural principles,

to undertake research and experimentation relevant to the advancement and

improvement of woodland management and wildlife conservation

And

to encourage public consultation and involvement in the management and use of the

city’s woodlands.

Importantly, the Woodland Policy, which had resulted from widespread consultation had

benefited particularly from a robust, multi-disciplinary dialogue with local experts on

natural history. This discussion and debate had taken place through the pioneering

mechanism for the time of the Amenity Woodlands Advisory Group, and then the

Moorlands & Woodlands Advisory Group. The policy and the strategic tools building

towards it, included both the desire to re-establish appropriate management, and at the

same time, to recognise and establish suitable areas for “non-intervention” as a “positive

management tool”. This latter was based on a realisation that in some cases it was

desirable to allow nature to take its own course. Furthermore, all major interventions in

local sites such as woods were to be in the context of widespread consultation with local

experts and with residents, with agreed management plans, and with site visits to discuss

actual management intervention proposals.

Finally, in the early spring of 1988, following the approval of a management plan

(Sheffield City Council, 1987b), a major programme of thinning and group felling began

with operations designed to continue over a five-year period. However, to underline the

sensitivity of this interventionist management, Dan Lewis, the Council’s woodland officer,

took a number of precautionary steps to allay fear among local residents. Before work

began, public meetings and public “walk-abouts” were organised for Council members

and the public (Figure 4). These were to explain what was going to happen, why and when.

At the same time, local residents living immediately beyond the woodland boundaries

received letters informing them of the operations, and posters were distributed to local

branch libraries and other community centres. Dan Lewis also went on local radio to

explain the need for active vegetation management in the wood. Finally, a major feature

was published in the local evening newspaper under the title “Massacre” in a good cause

(Pleat, 1998). Quoting Dan Lewis at length, readers were told clearly, that for a hundred

years the wood had been left “to fall into rack and ruin” (p. 6). It was pointed out that the

wood now consisted of tall trees identical in size “starving smaller trees, bushes and the

woodland carpet of light and life” (p. 6). It quoted Dan Lewis as saying “Twenty or 30

years ago there were bluebells and other flowers carpeting the floor of this wood. Now

there’s nothing” (p. 6). The article concluded by noting that the Council was not expecting

an easy ride when the intensive felling and thinning scheme began. Nevertheless, it


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pointed out, the public must accept it if they wanted to prevent the woodland from

“becoming a tree and flower graveyard” (p. 6).

In the northern section of the wood, thinning and group felling, was the major

operation (Figure 5). In the heavily eroded and compacted parts of the southern section of

the wood, a more radical approach was adopted, and the site was shallow ploughed in

order to break up the panned spoil to facilitate regeneration. In retrospect, this action was

undoubtedly damaging to the site archaeology, as we now know that the area is rich in

features such as tracks and charcoal hearths. When this work was being done, even the

ancient nature of the wood was still being questioned. Today we would certainly not

advocate such drastic intervention in an ancient woodland site, though at the time the work

proved a useful and informative experiment. Since the seed-bank was absent, succession

was aided by the addition of wavy hair-grass (Deschampsia flexuosa) seed as an

appropriate ancient woodland species. This was purchased at great expense, as a UK

native from the only site licensed to supply it; this was Site of Special Scientific Interest

grassland in the English midlands. However, its provenance has been put into doubt by the

appearance in the regeneration of white woodrush (Luzula luzuloides), a European non-

native in the UK, and found naturalised in a few places. This is its only Sheffield location.

This active management was designed to provide more space for native trees to

develop and to help diversify the woodland by encouraging regeneration of the shrub layer

and the flowering of the ground flora. The latter had been suppressed by lack of light

reaching the woodland floor. The thinning was irregular, with several 30-metre wide

glades created by cutting trees to ground level from which coppice growth subsequently

grew (Figure 6). Young hazel trees, a major constituent of the shrub layer when the wood

was managed as a coppice, were planted. Pathways were also improved. Altogether, some

350 tons of timber were extracted. Over the following 10 years, there was widespread

regeneration of trees and shrubs and ground flora was much improved. In many parts of the

wood, the thinning resulted in the dense growth of young beech.

Figure 4. A guided walk in the wood for the public prior to the implementation of the 1987–1991management plan.


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Renewed Management: Phase 2, the last 15 years

A major influence on local attitudes to woodland management in the last two decades has

been the South Yorkshire Forest Project (now Partnership). This project, established in

1991, is a partnership between Barnsley, Rotherham and Sheffield Councils, and the

former Countryside Agency and the Forestry Commission. Its aim is to develop

multipurpose forests that will create better environments for people to use, cherish and

enjoy. The South Yorkshire Forest area covers most of the Coal Measure country in the

three metropolitan districts. Although not just concerned with ancient woodlands, among

its objectives are commitments to protect areas of historical, archaeological and ecological

interest (i.e. the existing ancient woodlands), to increase opportunities for access and

recreation, and to encourage the development of timber-based industries, employment

opportunities and woodland products. Following a year of public consultation, the South

Yorkshire Forest’s first Plan was published in August 1994. This established a policy

framework and a strategic approach to woodland management throughout the South

Yorkshire Forest area, for private as well as publicly owned woods, and guided

developments well into the twenty-first century. A key impact of the early days of the

project was that money was forthcoming to survey and assess local woods and to produce

management plans for them (Milego et al., 1995, Sheffield City Council, 2000a).

Figure 5. Thinning of beech and sweet chestnut in the northern section of the wood in the earlyspring of 1988.


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In 1997, the South Yorkshire Forest Team put together a £112million bid to the Heritage

Lottery Fund for a five-year action plan to restore 35 Coal Measures woodlands in Sheffield,

Rotherham and Barnsley: called Fuelling a Revolution – The Woods that Founded the Steel

Country (South Yorkshire Forest, 1997). In February 1999, it was announced that the bid had

been successful and a five-year Heritage Woodlands Project was launched in September

1999. Twenty-one of the 35 woodlands within the project, including Bowden Housteads

Wood, were in the ownership of Sheffield City Council. There has been much activity on a

broad front connectedwith the project: archaeological surveys, development ofmanagement

plans (more than 30 council-owned woods have management plans), active woodland

management programmes, interpretation for local communities, the development of

educational materials and programmes and the commissioning of public art works.

As part of this project a second management plan for Bowden Housteads, to build on

the work undertaken between 1987–1991, was compiled, covering the period from 2000

to 2005 (Sheffield City Council, 2000b). In 1999, prior to the plan being produced, a small-

scale household questionnaire survey was undertaken (100 persons) and a visitor survey

(50 persons). Results of the surveys very much echoed those of the 1986 survey. People

said they used the site because of the peace and quiet away from traffic, the wildlife and for

Figure 6. A stream-side glade.


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exercise. They disliked the continued vandalism, litter, motorbikers, and the feeling that it

was not an altogether safe place. The improvements most frequently requested were

a nature trail, information boards and guided walks, a staff presence and more wildflowers.

Following work by Sheffield Wildlife Action Partnership in the early 1990s, a small

“Friends of Bowden Housteads” group had been formed in 1996. This group of enthusiasts

funnelled local concerns to the local authority woodland managers.

The management plan for 2000–2005 reflected the desire of the city’s woodland team

to try to solve the problems raised and the requests made by the public. The vegetation

management objectives of the plan were to restore natural species composition by

continued selective thinning of beech, sweet chestnut and sycamore to encourage natural

regeneration. Willow is encouraged in selected wet areas and the age diversity of the

woodland is further encouraged through the reintroduction of small group felling. It was

stated that surveys would be undertaken to monitor ecological change, though in practice

this is rarely done. Additionally, access would be improved through upgrading the path

system (Trans-Pennine Trail and National Cycle Route (Sustrans) pass through the site),

and educational and interpretive materials would be produced. The last objective resulted

in the production of an illustrated leaflet and the commissioning of a piece of public art

that is sited just inside the southern section of the wood beside the Sheffield Parkway. It is

a sculpture by Jason Thomson of a steel giant. This artwork reflects the close relationship

between Sheffield’s ancient woodlands and its steel industries (Figure 7).

The most recent plan for the wood covers the period 2009–2013, with the site

managed as a Local Nature Reserve in partnership with Sheffield Wildlife Trust. This aims

to build on the work undertaken as part of the plans for 1987–1991 and 2000–2005. The

vegetation management will consist of continued small-scale thinning to promote uneven-

aged woodland and a diversity of species, structure and habitats. Operational methods that

avoid excessive disturbance will be employed. Native tree and shrub species will be

favoured and natural regeneration will be used wherever possible to provide new trees.

During thinning operations, a proportion of trees will be allowed to develop to over-

maturity and natural senescence. Where not a danger to the public, dead wood, standing

and fallen, will be allowed to undergo natural decay processes.

Along with the impacts of reduced resources for local authorities and agencies, recent

cuts in public funding have proved problematic for the South Yorkshire Forest Partnership

and for projects that depend on it for support. Lack of resources has meant a much reduced

public profile and only limited resources allocated for on-going research and monitoring

(essential for such large-scale management projects as this), for public awareness raising

or professional staff training, and for actual site conservation work. A serious problem of

these austerity measures is the loss of continuity in management and especially in the

knowledge of management, which we argue is so vital for future sustainability.

Remarkably, at the start of this present cycle of management around 30 years ago, all local

knowledge of these woods, their heritage and their origins, had been lost. This cultural

severance between the natural resource and local people is a serious threat to long-term,

future conservation of this and of other sites (see Rotherham, 2007, 2009 & 2012).

Another, often unspoken, issue is the tension or even rivalry that exists between different

departments in local authorities and even between the same and external organisations.

With a site such as Bowden Housteads Wood, great efforts were made to bring together

planners, planning countryside officers, highways and footpaths officers, ecologists, and

tree or woodland managers to collaborate on a shared project. Much of the success of this

collaboration was due to the personal efforts of the Woodland Officer of the time, Dan

Lewis. However, over the 30 years of the study, the site has still been adversely affected by


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a lack of collaboration or mutual support between certain key players and stakeholders.

Even today, there is still no coherent and visible presence of support officers on site to

work with local people. Interviewing local users in the wood, 30 years on from when we

started work, they still care about their wood, and still bemoan the fact that there is no

warden or ranger to help them. They still suffer from illegal motorcycle use, trees set on

fire, fly-tipping, antisocial use, and now a new fashion for burning out plastic supermarket

baskets as impromptu barbeques. Moreover, they still feel unsupported.

Conclusions

Bowden Housteads Wood has been transformed over the last 30 years (Figure 8).

Moreover, over the same period, awareness of the cultural importance of all local ancient

woods has been raised to a much higher level than hitherto. Interest in their historical and

nature conservation importance, and in their recreational and educational potentials, has

been awakened and developed. However, it has become clear to all concerned, that

management of broadleaved public woodlands is not a one-off event; it needs to be

continuous and long-term, and this is threatened by today’s public policies (Rotherham,

2010). The work that is currently taking place is very encouraging, but it is just the

beginning; the challenge, as everyone well knows, is to sustain it in the medium and long

Figure 7. Jason Thomson’s steel giant.


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term. What is equally clear is that managing public amenity woods in a heavily populated

urban area in the late twentieth and twenty-first centuries is as much about public relations

as it is about woodmanship and ecological principles.

Problems remain despite the good work. Remarkably, in the 1990s, the surviving old

woodman’s cottage, by then sadly neglected but nevertheless an important part of the

woodland’s history, was, without consultation, demolished on safety grounds and the plot

sold to a local developer. The location now remains derelict and not even the footings were

saved as future heritage. Another blow to the woodland regeneration was the major

development of lands adjacent when factories were demolished and redeveloped as a

major ASDA store and associated car park. This clearly affected the one remaining active

watercourse in the northern section of the wood, and this by 2005, was dry. The woodland

compartment that was the best for relict ground flora until the 1990s, was already in sharp

decline. Nobody from either the City Council or ASDA was willing to comment.

However, this sad incident did serve to confirm the importance of catchment theft in the

deterioration of many isolated urban ancient woods. This is a serious and insidious

problem for many urban ancient woods (see, for example, Rotherham, 2012).

Furthermore, in the brave new world of austerity, commitments to public and expert

consultation have been quietly forgotten or overlooked. Significantly, the pre-management

Figure 8. A scene in Bowden Housteads today.


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site meetings no longer take place and even management plans are often neglected or

ignored. Ideas of best practice fostered by the old Countryside Commission and such basic

matters as a management plan being in place and consulted upon prior to site works

commencing, have been dropped. Interestingly, and indeed worryingly, local authority

commitments to all these things and to non-intervention conservation areas for example,

have not been formally overturned. They are simply ignored. Also of concern for nature

conservationists, is the move in urban areas especially, back to horticulturally-driven

management uninformed by conservation. These problems are compounded by a

reduction in the skills base of those responsible for implementing site management

compared to the earlier stages of this management cycle. This is somewhat ironic given the

increased awareness of the history, ecology and heritage of sites such as Bowden

Housteads. When the project began, there was little understanding of the true antiquity of

the wood and certainly no knowledge whatsoever of the woodland heritage interest such as

the charcoal hearths and trackways.

There are other serious issues too. Local households abut many urban woodland sites

and they make incursions into woodland boundaries, which if not challenged, result in loss

of the wood to piecemeal encroachment. The same householders also tip garden waste and

rubbish into the sites. This is especially problematic in woods such as Bowden Housteads,

since the relict ancient woodland flora survives, just, as a halo around the fringes of the

wood. There may also be remains of ancient woodland boundary features. All these

problems amount to threats to sustainability of the woodland resource, its ecology and its

heritage. At Bowden Housteads in 2011, a householder had tipped garden spoil over one of

the only sites for the uncommonwoodland grasswoodmelick (Melica uniflora) and tomake

things worse, the spoil included Japanese knotweed (Reynoutria japonica). This incursion

and the other problemswere reported to the City Council’sWoodland Officer but it remains

unclear what, if any, action was taken. Local authority resources and the demands placed

upon them do not match up. Therefore, we see here one small example of the gradual

decline of local native woodland species, and the inability of those responsible to take

effective action.However, there is the additional issue of the spread of exotic and potentially

invasive plants. In urbanwoodlands, some degree of recombinant ecology is bound to result,

and indeedOliver Gilbert argued that not only should this be accepted as inevitable, but also

perhaps evenwelcomed as thewoods acquired a distinctive urban character (Gilbert, 1989).

Around the periphery of woods such as Bowden Housteads, there are piles of garden waste

and garden fly-tipping, and these generate nodes for the spread of exotic plants into the

wood. In most cases, the newcomers barely survive, and if they do so, it is mostly around

the fringeswhere the soils are deeper, richer and less acidic. Few are able to tolerate the poor,

acid soils of the core woodland. Occasionally, however, local gardeners decide to

“improve” thewood by deliberately planting garden plants deep into the heart of the site. On

the field trip to this site for the 2011AABconference, a single clump of Spanish bluebell was

found almost in the centre of the wood. Yet there was no sign of its spread and no obvious

evidence of any hybridisation with the native bluebells close by. Other species found in

this and other urban woods include garden varieties of Aquilegia and ofMontbretia, again

just hanging on but not invasive. Variegated yellow archangel (Lamiastrum galeobdolon

var argentatum) is certainly spreading here and at other urban sites, yet surprisingly remains

largely “under the radar” for most conservation groups. The presence of these species, non-

native as they are, raises uncomfortable questions for conservationists. However, whilst this

is ancient, semi-natural, urban woodland it has a canopy which results largely from

replanting. The survivors of the Victorian planting scheme are mostly oak, beech and sweet

chestnut, the others long since succumbing to the gross air pollution, which prevailed until


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the 1960s. Even the oak may not be of UK-origin genetically, since many oaks were

imported from nurseries inHolland. It seems, therefore, that Oliver Gilbert’s predictions for

the future ecologies of our urban woods will to a degree come true. Like it or not, these sites

are acquiring a mixed or hybrid ecology of native and exotic ground flora plants.

Whitebeams and Norway maples are also invading from nearby roadside planting schemes

as landscape planners and architects contribute to the recombinant mix. None of this

diminishes the value of the relict ancient woodland species in a site such as this, though it

may make conservation more difficult. The ancient woodland flora has survived for

centuries and it provides visible continuity to the past and a resource, which local people

certainly treasure. In woodland such as Bowden Housteads, past and present are fused and

the result is a recombinant ecology and a resource that requires careful and long-term

management. With certain dehydration and possible climate change, the challenges for this

and for other urban woods, are enormous.

Acknowledgements

The authors thank Sheffield City Council officers and managers for valuable discussions andassistance over the years: Jim Kerr, John Gilpin, Dan Lewis, Nick Sellwood and Ted Talbot. Wethank delegates at the 2011 AAB conference on Vegetation Management for their feedback, and forreferees from the same conference for their comments and advice.

Notes on contributors

Melvyn Jones is Visiting Professor in Landscape History at Sheffield Hallam University. His twobooks Sheffield’s Woodland Heritage (Wildtrack Publishing, 4th edition, 2009) and Rotherham’sWoodland Heritage (Rotherwood Press, 1995) were used as the basis for a successful £1.5m bid torestore 35 South Yorkshire ancient woods (Fuelling a Revolution Project, 1999–2005).

Ian Rotherham is an ecologist and landscape historian.

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Documents

Managing urban ancient woodlands: A case study of Bowden Housteads Wood, Sheffield