Epping Forest - still growing
I 03
Grey and Glaucous. Ragwort and Thistles still predominate but of course they too attract many
insects, including the beautiful Cinnnabar moth in its hundreds Bush Grass (Calamagrostis epigejos)
is scattered across the site too.
Considering the intensive farming history of the site it has been a great turnaround. The incipient
grassland will be subject to monitoring and an experimental mowing regime to try to learn more
about the dynamics of a managed grassland. There is a great deal to learn from the way in which the
grassland is developing.
The diversity that the Trueloves sward has been able to develop owes a lot to its sister site. Fernhills.
Fernhills is a lovely place. From the top of the hill where Bluebells run out into the grassland, from
the fragment of the ancient Fcrnhills woodland, there arc magnificent, expansive views across the
Lea Valley to London and Hertfordshire. Often picked out by sunshine in the middle distance, beyond
a new development's red rash of rooves, sits the squat, pale tower of Waltham Abbey, an historic
link between the Valley and the Forest. King Harold gave the monks of the Abbey their Royal
Charter in 1062 and with it came lands including much of the northern Forest and possibly these
slopes.
Below the viewer's feet, in late summer the grassland is awash with the purple crowns of knapweed.
Its slopes fold and curve downwards into the thick scrub along the edge of the Green Lanes. A
Nightingale and several Song Thrushes have been recorded in the scrub each year and above them
Stock Doves breed in the old Oak pollards that mark out the old drovers' routes along the Green
Lanes.
The steepness of the inclines has resulted in much slumping of the Boulder and London Clays, with
the creation of little cliffs beloved by solitary wasps and bees. Aiding this natural erosion is the
seepage of water and this in turn produces, at the base of the slopes, a flush of characteristic wet
meadow vegetation.
For 500m, in a great horseshoe curve, the area underfoot is a carpet of Creeping Jenny and Ragged
Robin, probably one of the largest expanses of both species in Essex. Dotted across the area are
clumps of Square-stalked St. John's Wort and Fleabane. Fringed by Glaucous and other sedges arc
large patches of the slope where the mosses predominate. In these areas there is a large population of
Adder's-tongue Fern (at least 200 plants in 1998), which in May 2000 after the wet spring was
observed across even greater expanses of ground and is yet to be assessed.
Future Management
Both Fernhills and Trueloves need management. Although one is old and one new, the grasslands
arc being encroached upon by a creeping front of scrub. Also their diversity owes much to low-
growing and delicate herbs that cannot compete unaided in these areas against the taller grasses,
such as False Oat-grass (Arrhenatherum elatius) For both the best answer is grazing by traditional
breeds of livestock that can eat the coarser vegetation.
Despite the problems thrown up by the BSE crisis and the dearth of cattle in the county, The
Corporation of London has managed to begin grazing with English Longhorn cattle on Fernhills. It
is hoped that in a few years time they will move onto Truclovcs and the two areas will be grazed as
a unit allowing greater flexibility in their management. In the meantime, Trueloves will be mown
under a variety of experimental regimes, which promises to be a very important opportunity for
Essex Naturalist (New Series) 17 (2000)