A community in transition to a low carbon, sustainable, resilient life.
Exploring our parish
Having been living here for about five years, I have been exploring Forest Row off and on, but have started to be a bit more systematic of late. I think I've always enjoyed wandering around a locality with a view to getting to know it better, and spent a fair amount of time twenty odd years ago with copies of tithe maps and Victorian census returns as I thoroughly walked around Shaugh Prior in Devon. Local history probably got me started, and then you throw in the observing of the habitats and the flora and you start to realise how much fascinating time you can spend transforming and enlarging one's knowledge of where you live.
Two things catalysed my current spate of exploring: (a) Transition Forest Row, with the focus on our locality, and if we are to think about creating a sustainable life, then it seemed reasonable to know more about what's on our doorstep, whether that be wild food, the farms, or the wood; and (b) as a result of being on the parish council, which has produced some nice walks leaflets, I suggested another -- a tree walk. I knew that I didn't know that much about trees, being rather better on flowers, but it has got me out and about.
Fairly quickly I realised that I need to find out where the parish boundary is. There's a map in the community centre, and you can just about trace it on an OS map; Forest Row is a big place. We can easily just focus on the village itself, but it extends right up to Hammerwood and beyond to the Kent and Surrey borders, and then south to Wych Cross and over to Plaw Hatch. This maybe isn't a surprise, but it's a large area, covering quite a range of habitats, and lots of special environmental designations. For instance, here's a map of south of the village:
and here's the key:
It's a noisy map (from MAGIC) and is brimming with Ancient Woodland, SSSIs and other richness. Clearly, trying to put together a tree walk for the entire parish will be a long job, so for that I'm just restricting myself to the village itself, but that hasn't stopped me walking elsewhere.
I've been recording these walks on flickr, and the MAGIC maps have been invaluable in giving names to many of the Ancient Woodland sites, since many are not labelled on the 1:25000 OS map; since I'm living here, I felt that I wanted to know what places were called.
The environmental richness of our corner of Sussex is considerable, and the diversity is something to be treasured. Here, for example, is a sweet chestnut coppice with amazing bluebells ten days ago; it is part of Highams wood:
and this is a great old beech in part of Broadstone woods back in February:
Might this be an interesting blog theme as part of the Transition Forest Row ning site? Let me know.
Two things catalysed my current spate of exploring: (a) Transition Forest Row, with the focus on our locality, and if we are to think about creating a sustainable life, then it seemed reasonable to know more about what's on our doorstep, whether that be wild food, the farms, or the wood; and (b) as a result of being on the parish council, which has produced some nice walks leaflets, I suggested another -- a tree walk. I knew that I didn't know that much about trees, being rather better on flowers, but it has got me out and about.
Fairly quickly I realised that I need to find out where the parish boundary is. There's a map in the community centre, and you can just about trace it on an OS map; Forest Row is a big place. We can easily just focus on the village itself, but it extends right up to Hammerwood and beyond to the Kent and Surrey borders, and then south to Wych Cross and over to Plaw Hatch. This maybe isn't a surprise, but it's a large area, covering quite a range of habitats, and lots of special environmental designations. For instance, here's a map of south of the village:
and here's the key:
It's a noisy map (from MAGIC) and is brimming with Ancient Woodland, SSSIs and other richness. Clearly, trying to put together a tree walk for the entire parish will be a long job, so for that I'm just restricting myself to the village itself, but that hasn't stopped me walking elsewhere.
I've been recording these walks on flickr, and the MAGIC maps have been invaluable in giving names to many of the Ancient Woodland sites, since many are not labelled on the 1:25000 OS map; since I'm living here, I felt that I wanted to know what places were called.
The environmental richness of our corner of Sussex is considerable, and the diversity is something to be treasured. Here, for example, is a sweet chestnut coppice with amazing bluebells ten days ago; it is part of Highams wood:
and this is a great old beech in part of Broadstone woods back in February:
Might this be an interesting blog theme as part of the Transition Forest Row ning site? Let me know.
Add a Comment
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Comment by Mike Grenville on May 29, 2008 at 8:06pm - drat - I didn't spot the location limt
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Comment by BradScott on May 29, 2008 at 7:46pm - Yes, Schmap would be good, but you can only create them for a predetermined set of cities. I've mailed them to see if they'll extend it.
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Comment by Mike Grenville on May 29, 2008 at 12:15am
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this is an interesting site that looks as though it offers a neat way to publish the work you are doing in documenting the village surroundings:
http://www.schmap.com/publish-a-schmap
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Comment by Mike Grenville on May 16, 2008 at 4:52pm
- yes it would be great to have the area around the village documented here. We could also get older members of the community to tell tales about places we could write up and shoot videos
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