I suppose we should not be surprised as it is February and we have had quite a good winter so far, but as I write this it is snowing like mad outside -at least 3 inches and still lying. If this keeps up it will make work difficult to say the least but we will just have to make the best of it as we do every winter. It is just one of the joys of living at 1100 feet above sea level – the views are great but the weather can be terrible.
I want to say Welcome to James and Phil the latest members of our happy team!!. James is still at college and getting some part time practical experience with us and Phil is working as a groundsman/ whatever needs doing person. I hope they have a long and happy association with Woodland Enterprises as fortunately we have been get busy lately. Long may it continue.

To all our customers, old new and prospective we at Woodland Enterprises wish you all a very merry christmas and a happy new year. Let’s make 2012 a good one and never mind what the doom and gloom merchants have to say – eat drink and be merry. Best wishes to you all

As it is usually my mother who updates the blog – I just give her the info to write – and she has been laid up with a bad back so the blog has slipped down the “to do” list somewhat. Also we have been very busy particularly as the days are so short and the weather has been pretty miserable. Still this time last year we had about 2 foot of snow so it could be a lot worse.
We have been supplying plenty of logs to our regular customers and also quite a few hundred birch bundles to the local racecourses and racehorse trainers. If the ground stays frozen the racing will be called off or delayed for a while but the fences still have to be rebuilt and in place ready whatever the weather.
At home we have taken delivery of an egg incubator and my mother is going to have a go at hatching some game birds such as pheasant and partridge and then releasing them on site once they are big enough. We will also try and rear some more chickens and some ducks for the first time so we will let you know how you get on.

First of all apologies for the long delay in updating the blog. I have been so busy (not complaining), I have just not had the time to log in and write a new article so apologies if you think I had died or left the country.
A couple of weeks ago I was asked to take down some dangerous trees outside a farmhouse locally and it turned out that the house belonged to a couple who had known with my parents several years ago but we had not made the connection at the time. Their son is now our postman and he saw the sign for Woodland Enterprises and asked me to go to his parents house and do then an estimate. When I got there his parents made the connection to my parents and the fact that their daughter Sarah used to spend a lot of time at the Pony Club with my sister Louise. I took the trees down and they were happy with the work and the price and then after many years of not seeing each other the two sets of parents bumped into each other in Barnard Castle. Small world or what??
We are very busy doing birch bundles for the racecourses at the moment and have had to take on some casual labour to do the work – it may lead to a permanent job if things work out. Also the weather is getting colder and the log season will be starting soon, some of our regular customers like to stock up with logs in advance so the have started ringing their orders in. We often deliver these in the evening if people have been out at work all day and that is where I am off now. I will try not to leave to so long before writing another article.

Our work changes as the seasons change as you will have noticed if you have been following this blog. Because we work outdoors all the time we are somewhat obsessed with the weather as it directly affects what work we can and cannot do. However it is hard to beat the warm sunny weather we have been having lately and even if the ground is a bit hard and the farmers are wanting more rain, it has made our jobs a lot more pleasant recently. We have even managed to get a bit of a sun tan on some of the parts not exposed at other times of year!!
The forestry side of our work goes quiet in the summer but we have been busy doing gardenning and maintenance jobs for some of our regular customers. This is the best time of year to make structural changes to the garden such as new fences, patios, ponds, paths, gates, hedge trimming etc and any major repairs or redesigning of the garden layout There is also the regular grass cutting and lawn repairs to do and plenty of general tidying up and replanting. At home we have started to harvest quite a few vegetables and salad crops which saves money on the grocery bill. Our pond is teeming with life as well as being a good food source for all the nesting birds we have in the nearby trees and hedges. The first clutch of swallows have fledged last weekend and it is lovely to see them swooping about while they practise their new flying skills. Some of the nest boxes we put up last year are in use for the first time but others must be still too new as they have not been used yet. The birds seem to be mistrustful of anything too shiny and new and prefer nest sites that are a bit weathered. It certainly is a great time of year and hopefully we can all get outside and enjoy watching the wildlife locally.

We seem to have had a rush on portable fences in the last couple of weeks. Maybe it is because it has rained at last and the ground is a bit softer, it has been far too hard to do much jumping lately. The summer show season is also underway and peope will be wanting to dust off last years practise fences for a facelift and/or get some new ones. We usually build a few new ones for show organisers as well as we specialise in the more natural type of portable fence for the working hunter classes. We can and do supply painted show jumps as well but those made of natural wood. logs and birch/green fillings are getting more popular with most of our customers. They make good practise fences for pointers and cross country horses as well.
The tree surgery work slows down at this time of year as the birds have started nesting and rearing their young.
We have got several sets of swallow nests at home and the hedges are full of nesting birds which is great to see.
We are doing a respacing job for the Commission in Hamsterly at the moment and the forest is looking very green and attractive now with whole avenues of trees growing across roads to meet in the middle. The visitors and cyclists are enjoying themselves as the weather improved so the place is a lot busier than usual. Most people go there to enjoy and appreciate the countryside but I still see people dropping litter which drives me nuts – why go to a beautiful place and then leave rubbish behind – pick it up and take it home for heavens sake. Here endeth todays lesson, enjoy the nice weather.

Apologies for not updating the blog since January but it has been very busy here lately. At home we have got sheep having lambs, pigs rearing piglets and our springer spaniel producing pups so it is like the labour ward in a hospital lately!! Good to see all the new life though especially as the nesting birds are starting to arrive and build their new homes, the crocuses are flowering and looking pretty and the daffodils are on their way. I think that when the lambs and the daffs appear it is definetly winter over and spring on the way, even if the weather does not always seem to follow suit.
At work we have been doing a big fencing job for the Forestry Commission in Hamsterley right on the edge of the fell. This is very scenic and beautiful location on good days and very cold and windy on bad ones! Also we have been producing birch bundles for Carlisle and Hexham racecourses and a couple of private trainers who are new customers to us. The logs and firewood are still selling well but this will start to slow down from April/May depending on the temperatures of course. We have also been doing some hedge planting and “gapping-up” of established hedges in the Durham and Barnard Castle areas. The tree surgery work will go quiet from the end of this month once the birds are nesting properly and we usually start doing more gardening and landscaping jobs. Touch wood the work still seems to be coming in at the moment despite the recesssion so long may it last.

The weather has been making life difficult for us again at Woodland Enterprises – you will have noticed that we are somewhat obessed with the weather here !! However we are back working normally again after all the snow and now we just have to worry about the wind, the rain and the mud!! Still we knew it was not life in an office when we all decided to work in forestry so it is no good complaining, we will just get out the thermal undies and get on with it!
Andrew has been on an Environmental Principles and Best Practice course recently and has passed his Level 2 award from the chartered institute of environmental health. As you will have noticed from previous blog postings this is a favourite subject of ours and we pride ourselves on our environmental credentials so it is nice to have a certificate posted in the office to prove that at least one of us knows what we are talking about. Our efforts at improving the environment at home by planting more trees and hedges etc seems to be paying off as we have got a resident stoat now. He seems quite a cheeky fella and is not at all shy as he runs across the muck heap and along the top of the fences beside the stables without making any effort to conceal himself. He has probably been attracted here by the numbers of wild rabbitts that keep eating the brussel sprouts and cabbages in the vegetable garden. Personally I am very glad to see him as the rabbitts were getting a bit out of control and I suspect he will sort them out for me.
I hope all our customers and friends had a good festive season and that 2011 is a good year for us all.

Just a quick one to say hope you all had a good Christmas and a Happy New Year to all our customers old, new and those we have not met yet!
May 2011 be a successful, fullfilling and prosperous year for us all and to quote someone else it is better to look ahead and prepare than to look back and regret. We thought this would make a good moto for 2011 as it applies to trees, gardens, fences and most things we do here at Woodland Enterprises as well as to plenty of other things in life. Best Wishes for 2011.

Apologies for the delay in updating the blog again but it has been very busy here lately which I realise is something we should be grateful for in a recession. We have had quite a few enquiries via the website recently as well as our regular customers which is very encouraging. We usually work in the North East England area as well as North Yorkshire and Northumberland/ Tyne & Wear areas but we have had some enquiries from the North of Scotland, Wales and Huntington via the website. As we really do not like to turn down work if at all possible we have all been travelling about a fair bit lately. We have even had to rope in my mother and her friend Rosie as delivery drivers so that the workers can get on and work while the “ladies” deliver birch bundles to the racecourses and trainers.
The point to point season starts in the New Year so a lot of the hunt committees are getting their fences rebuild or repacked with birch in preparation. The weather is of course getting more unpredictable now and the days are shorter so it can be hard to get everything all done in the available daylight. Still we could be worrying about being too quiet or having no work so we will definatley not complain about being busy.