Tom Burt’s Hill

High Wycombe Community Board kindly supported us in investing funding in Tom Burt’s Hill to enhance it for biodiversity, access and for the community to enjoy.

We have installed a new kissing gate, fencing and steps to make it much easier to use and a member of the public thanked us via Facebook on the day of installation!

A ladder board helps remind people: where they are and how to behave in the mantra of ‘take only photos & memories, leave only footprints, kill only time…’

New benches are in and there are lots of bird & bat boxes up too. Keep an eye out for baby birds this spring.

Woodland Habitat

Lots of habitat work has happened too: tree safety work doubles up as creating two new mini beast skyscrapers as two beech trees were monolithed.  They had been weakened by fungal disease and their size posed a risk to neighbouring property. So we reduced them significantly in height and now they are left to rot over time, creating valuable standing deadwood homes for fungi, invertebrates such as beetles, birds including woodpeckers nuthatches and bats.

All the branches are left on site to rot slowly thus locking up carbon for years and at the same time creating deadwood habitat on the ground.  This habitat is super  important for invertebrates but also provides shelter for nesting birds such as Wrens and cover for small mammals like hedgehogs.

In time brambles will grow over and thickets will form round the deadwood providing the perfect place for birds such as blackcaps and song thrush to nest.