Woodlands Walk

  1. Leave the estate yard by the top gate and turn right. Watch out for oncoming traffic. Cross onto the grass verge by the wood and walk along the verge leaving the woodland on your left.
  1. Turn left and continue uphill, keeping the woodland to your left. The plantation here contains Douglas fir, Sitka spruce and Corsican pine that was first planted in the late 1930s.
  1. Carefully cross the roads coming in from your left and walk on up the drive until you reach a post with a way-mark on it.
  1. Turn left and walk along the top of the field. The field is called Abraham’s, which is named after a family who lived there in the 1600. Now pass through the kissing gate.
  1. Turn left and head into the wood in front of you. Go through another kissing gate and follow this path until you reach a road. The plantation you are passing through has been managed for hundreds of years and contains ancient woodland. Here you can find wood avens, bluebells and old coppiced hazels.
  1. At the drive, walk ahead into Truckle Wood. Follow this path through the wood until you reach a track with a field in front of you. This is another area of ancient woodland; the last major planting here was of the beech and larch in 1948. The top part of the wood is stunning in late April, when carpeted with bluebells.
  1. At the track turn left and return back to the estate yard.

Features

Woodland ancient and modern

Tyntesfield’s woodlands have been carefully managed for hundreds of years. Some trees are managed as crop and others are planted for ornamental purposes. The Farm Plantation was an open pasture until beech trees were planted in around 1880. Wraxall Hill Woods has some ancient woodland dating back to the Middle Ages, but contains some areas that were planted or replanted in the 20th century. Truckle Wood is also ancient woodland, with an old holloway running through, but beech and larch were planted in 1948 for commercial timber production.

Names

The names of Tyntesfield’s woods, ancient and modern, are part of the area’s history. Abrahams or Abrams derives from ‘Abraham’s Corner’, a cottage and garden taking its name from the family who lived there in the 1600s. Fowl Pens, which today incorporates the car park and can be found next to Truckle Wood, is a reminder of the estate’s decline in the 20th century. It refers to the poultry farm established in the 1940s which was one of numerous attempts to boost the declining income of the estate.

Biodiversity

Wraxall Hill Woods and Truckle Wood have high biodiversity value created by historic management. There are many ancient woodland indicator species - old coppiced hazels, wood avens and bluebells. The lighter woodland rides are a good place to see speckled wood and gatekeeper butterflies. If you’re quiet, roe deer are sometimes seen nimbly passing through the woods. Truckle Wood has many old trees and is particularly stunning in late April when it is carpeted with bluebells.Farm Plantation is a good area for fungi such as the many zoned polypore which grows on fallen trunks.