Frilford Heath SSSI, 26th May 2012

By Andrew -
We returned to Woodhaven, Frilford today to tackle the Himalayan balsam on the Natural England site.

Mr Amey, the landowner, warned us that a roe deer, which probably had young, had been spotted in the woodland area. In fact we did spot a deer on arriving at the site so we avoided that area.

We were pleased to see that a large part of the wood that we had worked on in the previous few Summers was relatively free of Himalayan balsam plants. The plants were still fairly small, so pulling them up required a lot of bending. On such a hot day, it was pleasant to work in a cool shady wood.

We have two more scheduled visits to Woodhaven this Summer so we hope we can make a real impact on the balsam.
-Eleanor
Himalayan Balsam

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