The woodland flora of the Forest of Writtle and surrounding area
Golden-rod Solidago virgaurea, Trailing St John's-Wort Hypericum humifusum and Devil's-bit
Scabious Succisa pratensis survive only on roadside verges. Lily-of-the-Valley was found here
during a survey by English Nature in the early 1990s but I have not been able to re-find it and
establish whether the native or garden variety was involved.
The management plan for the area, produced as a result of the above survey, has been put into
practice on a small triangle of heather grassland opposite The Cricketers pub. When the work
began only a few dozen Heather plants remained - the last of their kind in the Forest - but since the
clearance of most of the invading Gorse and Birch scrub by teams of volunteers numbers have
slowly increased. It has also benefited many other species including - inevitably - Purple Moor
Grass Molinia caerulea but also more desirable plants such as Heath Bedstraw, Early Hair-grass
Aira praecox, Wavy Hair-grass, Bulbous Rush Juncus bulbosus, Pill, Oval and Grccn-ribbcd Sedges
Carex binervis plus such characteristic heath-land bryophytes as Polystichum commune and
Pseudoscleropodium purum. The headmaster at Ingatestone Boys1 School, a keen naturalist, once
found thirty Adders Vipera berus in an afternoon in this area and it is pleasing that they still survive
- albeit in much reduced numbers - fifty years on.
The other distinctive area of the Common, namely The Moors, is depicted on the estate map of
1600 as an open area dotted with small thickets and like the rest of the common was probably used
for grazing. It has long since been colonised by Ash, Alder and Crack Willow but has a varied flora
of common woodland plants including large numbers of ferns, Lady and Scaly Male Fern Dryopteris
affinis among them. Slender Rush Juncus tenuis was found here in 2002 - the first record for the
Forest.
Mill Green Wood: TL640010 : Size: 2ha/5 acres. A pocket of mature Ash/Hornbeam woodland
in the southern, enclosed, half of Mill Green Common, but following severe gales during the winter
of 19S9-90, seventy-five per cent of the trees had been felled and an important little marsh in one
corner drained and converted into an ornamental pond! The marsh supported both Lemon-scented
Fern Oreopteris limbosperma and the last remaining colony of Marsh Pennywort Hydrocotyle
vulgaris in the Forest.
Box Wood: TL644016. Size: 6 ha/15 acres. Handley Barns Farm. Formerly known as Boxall
Wood. If Box Buxus sempervirens ever occurred in this wood I have been unable to relocate it. A
typical Oak standard, Hornbeam/Sweet Chestnut coppice that has not been cut for many years and
consequently has a poor flora.
Well Wood: TL647017. Size: 4 ha/J 0 acres. Handley Barns Farm. Formerly known as Apis Field
Wood. Similar to Box Wood and at one time attached to it by a narrow strip of woodland. Large
numbers of Black Italian Poplar were planted in it after the 1939-45 war, many of which have since
been toppled by winter gales. There is a small colony of Opposite-leaved Golden Saxifrage
Chrysoplenium oppositifolium in a ditch along the northern boundary, surprisingly, the only site in
the Forest for this species.
Bushey Wood: TL657015. Size: 4 ha/10 acres. Handley Green (formerly Handley Barns) Farm.
Previously known as Gust Leaze Wood, it was renamed by Ordnance Survey in the nineteenth
century. The straight edges and rectangular shape of this small Ash/Hornbeam coppice suggests
that it was planted (rather than arose naturally) on former meadowland, sometime between 1600
and 1779. It is a classic Bluebell wood but also supports a rich variety of other species - especially
in a recently coppiced area at the southern end - among which are Wood Speedwell Veronica
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