Springtime at Beauchamp Woods
My parents and I have recently purchased a piece of woodland of about 3 acres, in Devon, called Beauchamp woods. It is a mixture of semi-natural ancient woodland, larch plantation and a clear-felled area. This is the perfect mixture for us. We wanted to give something back to nature by preserving a small piece of habitat for wildlife, whilst enjoying spending time in our woods. We are loving it and find it very rewarding.
I have some knowledge of woodland management and conservation through my education and work and it is great to have the opportunity to put this into practice. My main aim is to maximise biodiversity, I want it to be the best habitat for as many species as possible. To find this out we need an idea of what is already living in our woods, so we have started to do a bit of informal survey work – simply noting down a list of species. This is great fun as it largely involves just looking closely and taking lots of photos (so we can go home and look things up).
One of the most beautiful times at Beauchamp woods is definitely the Spring. The woods burst into life, as all the trees come into leaf, bluebells emerge creating a blue carpet across large parts of the woods, and the bird song is wonderful. Unfortunately, our wood is not on our doorstep and we were unable to see this transformation in person due to the lockdown.
We were lucky enough to have left a trail camera up at the woods just before the lockdown and the batteries held out! Below are two of our first images from the trail camera - hope to offer more images as time goes by.
These, combined with some regular visiting squirrels [to a dead wood pile in front of the camera] provided us with a time-lapse of the springtime transformation of our woodland.
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Discussion
Hi Jane
It is lovely and we have some open areas with bramble and foxgloves which make the perfect areas to look at woodland pollinators including butterflies and lots of bees.
It is great to see what’s going on in the woods when we aren’t there.
Hi Alice. The trail cam photos look good. What trail cam do you use and do you recommend it? Tony
What a beautiful part of the country.
I expect you will see some interesting woodland butterfly species .
Owning a woodland awakens many new interests. I started noticing bird calls and a tremendous variation of ferns and bryophytes in our tangled wet woodland.
Your open area is great because it gives you such diversification of habitat .
How lovely to be able to see the wildlife in your woodland with your trail camera!
Beautiful wood and lovely photos they are very clear.
Looking forward to seeing more, thank you
Hi Tony
The trail cam I have produces good photos and also has the facility to record videos too.
It is a Ltl Acorn camera, which is a relatively affordable one, as it was under £150 – some are very expensive.
It is easy to use and I have a lockable box for mine too for security. It takes rechargeable batteries but these easily last over 1 month depending on the amount of photos/videos it takes.
One downside I would say of this particular model is there are some delicate/weak joints which break very easily for something designed to be outside. The clip on the bottom for holding the batteries in for example snaps very easily – mine is currently modified with sticky tape and a elastic band to keep it together, but it does seem to still be weather proof.
I have had good experiences with Bushnell Cameras through my work, but I think these tend to be more expensive.
I’m actually thinking of upgrading mine, so I would definitely recommend doing some research to find the best model in your price range.
Alice
20 July, 2020