When we moved to our croft we had very little knowledge of woodland management but we knew we wanted to produce our own fuel, without cutting peat (which is the traditional fuel in crofting regions), and Al wanted to also produce timber and learn about other products from the woodland. This quickly led us to coppice management – a sustainable, simple and low impact method of woodland management that works on relatively short rotations to produce timber.
We set about to start understanding how we could use our existing woodlands under a coppice rotation, and how much extra woodland we’d need to be self sufficient in woodfuel. It’s been a long journey with a lot of learning (from limited examples in the Highlands). Since 2023 we have a coppice rotation started with 16 different areas on our croft and a neighbours woodland that we manage.
We cut one coupe (area) each year, a minimum of 0.25Ha or half an acre, and the theory is that once we cut all the areas, the first one will be ready to cut again. In total we have around 3 Ha (6 acres) under coppice mamagement.
Currently we just produce woodfuel and woodchip for ourselves from the coppice, as well as a few craft products from the better timber. But in future as we get further into the rotation we will have surplus and higher quality rods which will be used for other products such as charcoal, garden stakes and beanpoles, woven fences, greenwood crafts and much more.
We intend to dive deeper into our coppice plans and manaement in blog posts so watch this space. You can join our newsletter to keep updated.
