Why should I keep to Public Rights of Way?

Please do keep to the Bridleway, The Brenda Parker way and the other public rights of way around our wood as found on the OS map. There are good reasons for this.

1. Your safety. Many of the trees are old and unwell, liable to fall or shed branches. We endeavour to keep those near public rights of way under review, checking them regularly, but don't have the budget or time to cover the whole wood.  Anyway, old, rotten trees provide good habitat for many other creatures so we want them to stay     - but they may not be safe for you. However, we recently had a huge oak we walk past every day fall across the bridleway. There was nothing apparently wrong with it. This is a salutory reminder that one can not know for sure what is going on inside trees and anyone doing so uses Haughurst Copse at their own risk.

2. There is a lot of interesting ground flora. If you stray off the main footpaths, you are crushing plants which may be important. Many of these are very special. Wood anemones, for example spread VERY slowly - 6m per century,  so stepping on them and squashing them causes huge long term damage.

3. There are creatures who either live here already or who we want to encourage back who live on the woodland floor. The caterpillar of the Silver Washed Fritillary butterfly; dung beetles; stag beetles; glow worms and hazel dormice to name but a few. Walking in the wood risks killing these creatures - and you probably won't know you have done it.

4. As this woodland is ancient, there has been a long time for the life in the soil to form an eco-system. Your walking on it compacts the soil and does damage to the balance that has taken centuries to develop.

The owners, arborculturalists and volunteers only walk off the public rights of way as and when we are working an area.  We are working with a conservation forester to minimise soil damage when removing trees in the broad leaved area of the woodland. Please be respectful  of what we are trying to achieve.