Most are hornbeam, grown from coppice stools. Horn ( = hard like horn) beam (a tree) is dense wood ideal for charcoal but also used in the past for ox yoke, good for coach wheels, lasts, tool handles, carving boards etc.

Over the hornbean will be found standard oak. Some are English oak but many are Turkey oak. The latter area easily identifed from the orange deep in the bark fishures (see photos) their leaves are also much larger than English oak. If it were me I'd favour the English oak.

If it were my wood I'd mark out the bluebell and wood anenome areas when they are in flower and in the summer when they are dormant brush cut any bramble growing over them. This will give them more light as the bramble is almost evergreen.

A small pond is just waiting to be cleared so it can spring back into life.

Parish is Smarden, district is Ashford Borough Council and county is Kent. The access is off Pluckley Road along a forest track. Inside there is a track and the wood is sufficiently open to walk through.

The woodland is covered by an article iv click here for details which does remove some permitted development rights.

The purchasers of the woodland will be asked to enter into a covenant to ensure the quiet and peaceful enjoyment of adjoining woodlands and meadows.

There is a public foot path across the north west corner.

The Victorians were very busy, had lots of money and lots of workers. The Dering Estate spread far and wide, an indication of this can be seen in the local houses, ragstone built with arched windows. They made great effords to lay extensive rides and drives through the woods mostly for their recreation (hunting or carriage driving). Always in straight lines and often radiating from a central point. They were keen on the Turkey oak, fast growing but of little use. During WW11 Italian prisoners of war did much to help the surface drainage forming ditches throughout the woods.