Last week saw the premier of a new film (embedded above) from our friends at Woods for the Trees. The film, entitled ‘Ancient Woodland Restoration: The Story of Light and Life’, is incredibly relevant to our latest campaign to restore the Ghost Woods – ancient woodland which haunts Forestry England’s plantation forests.

The film premiered alongside two others as part of Frome’s International Climate Film Festival (now in its fourth year). A spokesperson from Frome Town Council said of it, “Filmed in the heart of Cornwall’s rare ancient temperate woodlands, this film follows two restoration pioneers as they work to revive some of Britain’s most biodiverse and threatened habitats.”

Whilst we couldn’t make it to Frome ourselves, happily the film is also available to watch on Youtube. It explores the importance of our ancient woodlands and why people are working to restore them. Charly Le Marchant visits two sites in East Cornwall and talks to experts who are deeply involved in ancient woodland protection and restoration.

Firstly, Phil Sturgeon of Protect Earth is leading on a project to restore the ecological integrity of woodland on a plantation on ancient woodland site (or PAWs site) at High Wood near Liskeard. Sturgeon offers a fascinating explanation of the work that Project Earth are doing and the sensitivity the project requires. A really exciting aspect of this is that the woodland falls within a temperate rainforest zone and therefore has huge potential through the combination of climatic conditions and the remnants of native species within the soil. Temperate rainforest is an internationally rare habitat we highlighted as part of our Bring Back Britain’s Rainforests campaign. You can find out more about their importance in our previous blog.

To illustrate the dynamism of an ancient woodland ecosystem, Charly also meets with Mick Bracken, an outreach advisor from the Woodland Trust, and showcases the beauty and diversity of the ancient oceanic woodland at Millook on the North Cornish coast – a ‘jewel in the crown’ of ancient woodland with many features to explore from the indicator species flowers to the epiphytes, lichen and mosses.

At the start of the film, Charly quotes leading historian and ecologist of British woodlands, the late Oliver Rackham, who stated, “If restorers of wildwood are to get anywhere, they have to establish what it is they are trying to restore.” This film is a journey into exactly this: uncovering what ancient woodland is; how it can be identified; and the stages and challenges of ancient woodland restoration in places where it is on the brink of being lost forever. In short, this film is a story of hope – a story of life and light – and is therefore well worth the 20 minutes it takes to watch it.

Woods for the Trees is a series of films exploring the future for UK forests. If this film has whetted your appetite, be sure to check out their website to see more of their fantastic work.

And if you would like to see more ancient woodlands restored, get involved in our latest campaign to Rewild the Ghost Woods.