Worcestershire Woodland Guidelines

These guidelines allow you to visit our Worcestershire Woodland Guidelines map to access guidance on the biodiversity and landscape aspects of native woodland planting and management in Worcestershire.

The guidelines are intended to help create new or manage existing woodland in ways which complement or improve the current woodland landscape character and ecology of the county.

This information is aimed at professionals working in forestry, nature conservation, agriculture and land-use planning. But it will also be of value to land owners, community groups, students and anyone who has an interest in trees, woodland and the Worcestershire landscape.

The landscape guidance is based on the county Landscape Character Assessment and provides detailed recommendations on the pattern, size and location of woodland planting.

The biodiversity guidance is based on ecological zones derived from work to develop Natural Areas for Worcestershire. It provides advice on which species to choose to best reflect the natural woodland communities prevalent in the area. 

The accompanying document Trees and Woodland in Worcestershire  (3MB) gives the background to how these sources came to be used to develop the guidance, a history of the development of trees and woodland in Worcestershire and an overview of the current coverage and status. This includes the range of semi-natural habitats found in or associated with woodland in the county, and recommendations for how these habitats could be accommodated within planting schemes. This information should be read in conjunction with the Forestry Commission guides on new planting.

It is important to note that the Worcestershire Woodland Guidelines do not present an all-embracing guide to the creation and management of woodland and tree cover – their focus is purely landscape and biodiversity. Information on, for example, the commercial aspects of timber growing and/or archaeological considerations should be sought elsewhere. The guidance is intended to complement other documents such as the Forestry Commission's UK Forestry Standard  (974KB) and national guidance on Managing Ancient and Native Woodland  (2.8MB).

Regional context

To provide broader regional context, we recommend that the Worcestershire Woodland Guidelines are considered in addition to the Forestry Commission's regional Woodland Opportunities Map.

This piece of work looks at the potential for woodland creation across the region within four theme areas – landscape, biodiversity, cultural heritage and access. For each of these themes, maps of the region are provided which divide the Region into three zones for woodland creation – 'preferred', 'neutral' and 'sensitive' (where woodland creation is not targeted, although at a site level it is still possible that woodland could be appropriate in sensitive areas).

Get in touch for more information on the Worcestershire Woodland Guidelines For more information on the Worcestershire Woodland Guidelines you can contact the Environmental Policy team by Email. Or by post: Worcestershire County Council Spetchley Road Worcester WR5 2NP Telephone: 01905 766723.

This page was last reviewed 14 May 2013 at 11:29.
The page is next due for review 10 November 2014.