Connecting To The Land & Nature Through Skills

First Published November 22 2026

Edited January 17 2026

The English landscape is ancient and I think this ancient landscape is deeply misunderstood by many people who talk about connection to the land. The megaliths in the English landscape are a distraction. They are mostly out-of-date communal calendars, not unlike the more portable astrolabe or tombs. They are interesting, but the living ancient landscape is where we can best learn the connection to nature and the land in a meaningful and deeply fulfilling way.

Natural historic features in the English Landscape tell a story of missing people. The hedges and woodlands which once supported the livelihoods of whole communities of woodcutters, coppicers, bodegers, hudlers, charcoal makers and many more trades related to coppicing. The story of where most of these skilled men went is sad and it has resulted in the decline of ancient woodlands on a massive scale. Coppice on large estates is largely neglected, regarded as not economically viable for management. The self-styled "stewards of the land" have systematically neglected England's ancient woodland heritage.

England's ancient woodland neglect started with the Industrial Revolution, followed by the 1st world War. Skilled woodmen sent to die on the battlefields of Europe due to a Royal family tiff. The Second World War probably removed the last few woodsmen, and the invention of alternative materials like plastics, mass-produced ceramics, and glassware replaced many of the household products. Domestic Housecoal had already replaced most woodfuel. Charcoal was replaced by coke, wooden hurdles were replaced with galvanised steel gate-hurdles, and in modernity and industrial capitalism,  Woodland became marginal land or private shoots.

The origins of Coppicing in the UK are an ancient practice with roots in the Neolithic period, or Stone Age (around 5,000 BC). It was a widespread form of woodland management throughout the Bronze, Iron (Celtic),  Roman, and Saxon periods and became even more central to rural life in the medieval era, providing a steady supply of timber, fuel and products already mentioned The practice began to decline in the mid-1800s due to the Industrial Revolution and the increased availability of coal, but coppicing is now experiencing a resurgence due to its benefits for biodiversity and as a sustainable source of wood and other products.

There is nothing new about the term regenerative.

Coppicing has other names too: constant spring, letting in the light, both describe the processes taking place in the managed woodland. Tree stumps cut regularly go through repeated springs as they regenerate. There is nothing new about the term regenerative. Letting in the light is what happens when a coup (area) is cut. The time scale between cuts is short, rarely greater than 15 years for a slow-growing species like Box, which was used to manufacture print blocks. Hazel, however, is cut every 8 years, as is ash, every 1-15 years for tool handles. Oak was coppiced for ship timbers. Willow, sweet chestnut, and horse chestnut for charcoa. Alder coppice and charcoal were sought after by the gunpowder industry. The herbaceous layer in ancient woodlands is an ecosystem that has evolved and become dependent on letting in the light periodically.

The Doomesday Book, a catalogue of the value of English estates measured England's coppice woodlands in Faggots (bundles of poles). Vast areas of woodlands were recorded. This 1000-year-old record of our ancient ecological heritage is good for mapping contemporary decline. Today's output from ancient woodlands is negligible.

Other rural skills related to coppicing are pollarding, wood pasture management and hedge laying. All follow similar rotation times to coppicing.

My coppiced Willow Shiitake farm. I planted these trees 20 years ago and cut them on a 10-year rotation. Many of the stools died last year during the drought and then from bark beetle attack. Drought & severe heatwaves are slowly killing our native woodlands.

Our ancient coppice woodlands that have been neglected are a shadow of their former productive glory. Many of our woodlands and ancient landscape have changed beyond recognition since the UK extinction of the iconic English Elm. The biggest tree in the woods. Mightier than the Beech, the English Elm was the tree used to build the pilings for docks in the port of London and Liverpool. It was the wood of boat builders for its durability underwater.

Every wood from every tree has properties for which they were well known by those who harvested and utilised them. 

Plain was known as lacewood for its patterned grain. 

Lime known as butterwood for its softness and was sought out by decorative carvers like Grinling Gibbons.

Ash was for tool handles and Morris traveller chassis because of its shock absorbency.

Hazel by far has the highest versatility of usage,especially in the construction of wattle and daub thatched buildings. From the Hazel laths to hatching spars and staples. In  agriculture for hurdles.

New Problems For Nature Education

Now have a 21st century problem, its not a new disease, it is the "intuitive" knowledge of neo-pagan new-age shaman, who have spend minimal time in deep nature, or do any actual research before talking endlessley about their fantasy shaman-role-play world-view, one that does not reflect the reality of the historic landscape Coppicing in the past or now. 

A "shamanic journey" visualisation meditation through coppice ", last cut in the time of our grandfathers". This is not a thing in coppice management. Intuition cannot tell you how coppice is managed. This is careless research. Modern coppice management is essentially the same as it was 3000 years ago, apart from a few of the tools. 3000 years ago stone tools were favoured over Iron, and it was a matter of economics. Flint Axes stay sharper longer.

It is clear from the above that "That which you hold to be true" cannot be applied in the real world of Nature. If you seek to imagine a new world post-capitalism, post-ecological collapse, its ecological management requires scientific enquiry, even if it started with intuition.

Our Ancient ancestral woodlands have been in trouble for some time and while people might argue that this is only perceptible by botanists and biologists. The fact is that everyone I know who works in the woods agrees that the increased heat and drought are stresses. Temperate trees cease to photosynthesise when it's too hot.

Connecting to our ancient woodland, hedges and landscape heritage takes more work than sitting in the woods and asking what the trees want from us, do that by all means, trees love being noticed.

Imagine learning the skills to cut a pole and make the drum hoop from it yourself, with hand tools. I am not saying you should kill a deer for the skin, but how close can you get to a deer? Close enough to slit its throat with your bare hands and a knife?

Initiations Into Nature Connection Can Be Extreme

There is great power in ceremonial items made from foraged resources and then made from scratch without involving industrial capitalism's machines.

This Tinder Box is made entirely from Items harvested from the forest floor

These are the skills that help us connect to nature. These are the initiations which bring us close to the land through knowing the land and how our ancestors got through the bottleneck.

This Tinder Box is flammable. Pieces of the box could be sliced off for tinder. If necessary, but I doubt I would ever have to do that because in 4 hours I can make tinder from nettle fibre.

I am in no way claiming I am an expert in any of this stuff, but I have been doing it a long time and setting my limitations. I have lived off-grid, with and without electricity. But the greatest privilege was to live in community with an eternal fire.