Ancient Oaks In The New Forest

We have had an incredible couple of weeks going on adventures in the forest in search of Ancient Oaks. The inspiration came from our January subscription box from The Little Naturalist Club which had the theme of winter trees. We are big oak tree lovers in this house and this idea just sparked the most incredible experiences.

Oak trees have always had a special place in my heart, I even remember this one Oak tree who I used to sit under when I was around 10, she brought me such peace and was a place where I could lose myself in my dreams. I still to this day, 30 years later think of her!

We did a little research online and managed to find a list of some of the ancient Oaks in the New Forest. I’ve included our what3words for the oldest ones in case you also want to go on a little adventure to find them. An Oak tree is not considered ancient until they reach at least 400 years old.

Our first stop was obviously the Knightwood Oak (https://what3words.com/traded.snug.overhaul). She is thought to be one of the oldest trees in the new forest and has a girth of over 8 meters in 2016 which would make her approximately 704 years! Imagine all that she has seen! Of all the Oaks we visited she was the only one we were unable to measure ourselves and get a photo next to since she is within a big fenced off area for her own protection.

The day before Nixie had told me she wanted to make a journal of tree rubbings so we had also brought with us crayons along with our paper, pens, pencils, clipboard, and measuring tape oh and the beautiful winter tree cards that were also in our subscription box. What was really sweet was that Forrest had so much fun doing this, he has finally reached that stage where he wants to be more involved with what we are doing and it made me so happy to see.

Nixie loves measuring the Oaks and figuring out their approximate age. If you would like to have a go you can see which size girths equals which ages here or you can just have a look at this picture which was taken of a page in the little activity book that came with our January box.

After measuring a few trees and doing some bark rubbings it was time to go on an adventure to our next tree. We managed to find a what3words location for it so we used the map on our phone to guide us. It felt like we were on a proper treasure hunt! After about an hours walk (this is in kid time) we finally made it to Eagle Oak (https://what3words.com/neatly.range.verbs). We measured her at 6 Meters which gives her an approximate age of 400 years.

There's a sad story to this one though, in 1810 or thereabouts, a Sea Eagle was shot from its branches by an over-zealous New Forest keeper. The unfortunate bird, a White-tailed Eagle was amongst the last of these magnificent beings to be seen in the New Forest. There was another beautiful Oak that caught our eyes while we were enjoying the company of Eagle Oak so we decided to see how old she was as well before heading back home. We measured her to be 3.87 Meters which would make her 195 years.

We continued our search the next day, This time it was a beautiful foggy morning which just added to the beauty and mysticism of the forest. We headed to Oakley car park and saw three beauties right by the car park which we thought deserved to be measured. The first one we measured to be 3.72 Meters which would make her about 182 years.

The second Oak tree we measured to be 4.07 Meters which would make her 210 years.

The third Oak tree we measured to be 4.03 Meters which would make her 208 years.

Then we continued with another set of what3words to find the beautiful Undersley Oak (https://what3words.com/vipers.snippets.joke). This was another incredible adventure with many stops along the way.

When we did finally find her we were absolutely in awe, she was a beauty, probably one of my favourites so far! We measured her to be 6.80 Meters which would make her around 515 years. While here we met a really lovely wildlife photographer who we ended up chatting with about the forest and he told us about another impressive Oak named the Gritnam Oak which he thought we would love so he tried to give us directions and I took notes as best as I could!

A few days later we headed out to check out The Balmer Lawn Oaks, this time it was just me and the kids since Kevin was working. It was such a gorgeous day too with the sun shining down on us, it felt more like the early days of spring rather than winter. Again we had three different sets of what3words to help us find three trees but found a few more that we thought deserved to be measured. We really enjoyed spending time with these trees because we see these trees all of the time but have never thought to find out how old they are! The first one we measured was 6 Meters as well which makes her around 400 years old and you can find her at https://what3words.com/library.stag.geek 

and then another one pretty much right in front of that one and we measured her to be 5.05 meters which makes her around 300 years.

The next tree was another one which we had a what3words location for and was about a 5-10 minute walk away. When we found her we were in awe, she was gorgeous and the light couldn't have been more perfect! We measured her to be 6 Meters as well which makes her also around 400 years old (you can find her here: https://what3words.com/duck.uncle.setting).

We saw another tree in the distance which we thought looked beautiful too so we headed over to her as well and measured her to be 5 Meters which would make her around 300 years.

 The area around here was a little paradise for both Nixie & Forrest. Nixie was mesmerized by the sound of a woodpecker and both of them also had the best time finding the most perfect branch to bounce on, I swear Forrest almost fell asleep, it was that blissful. I only wish I could have joined them but they needed me to bounce them.

There was one more tree on our list to find and this one was heading back towards the Balmers Lawn Hotel, I already knew which tree it was and one year we even hung out under it with all the piggies during pannage season! But on our way there we decided to measure another beautiful Oak that caught our eye, she wasn't very big only 4 Meters which makes her about 200 years old but she was still a beauty!

The one we were really looking for was just a bit further along and she measured 6.23 Meters which makes her 434 years and you can find her here: https://what3words.com/visits.steady.differ.

She marked the end of our tree search around Balmer Lawn and after this photo was taken we headed over to Hollands Wood campsite to play a game of Escargot, a new French game we just discovered which is similar to hopscotch and we had the best time ever!

A few days later our search continued this time we were in such of the Moyles Court Oak (you can find her here: https://what3words.com/informal.doors.motored). We measured her at 7 Meters which makes her about 570 years! 

 We couldn't believe that we had never been here before! What a beautiful area which had the most incredible sand hills which both Forrest and Nixie couldn't get enough of!

 When we finally managed to get ourselves away from the sand hills we headed over to Minstead to try to find the Adam Oak  (you can find this one here: https://what3words.com/misfits.loopholes.decreased). This one was super hard to measure as it was in the middle of a hedge surrounded by Holly and thorny brambles, I ended up pretty battered afterwards but super pleased that we managed because it measured 8.67 Meters which would make it 810 years the oldest one yet!

Afterwards we headed over to Gritnam in search of the Gritnam Oak. We looked online for a location but to no avail and tried to find her just using the directions we were given in the forest the week before but unfortunately we couldn't find it so instead we just had a little picnic and enjoyed a hot chocolate.  We couldn't let it go and needed to find her and tried again the following weekend and at first we didn't think we were going to find her...we searched pretty much all of Gritnam woods walking in spirals trying to cover the entire area. We were on a mission!  We did find a skull though which we thought was pretty cool! We had even reached the point where we admitted defeat and said we will have to try again another time and try to put a post up online asking someone to help us.

But just as we arrived back to our car we decided to walk into the enclosure there and we met a sweet couple who we asked if they knew where it was, they didn't either, they only knew the Gritnam pub but the man was so friendly and even started making a few phone calls asking his friends but no one knew of this great Gritnam Oak! This just made us want to find it even more but then another couple came and we asked them and this time she knew where it was and tried to give us some directions. The lovely man who was making phone calls on our behalf managed to call another person who said it was pretty much directly under the location of the sun if you are standing in Gritnam so now we couldn't quit and go home.  Our hope was restored and instead of going home we decided to have one last try. Forrest was tired so I put him in the wrap and not long after he was asleep. We headed back into the direction which we had just came from and we spent ages and ages searching for it, me and the kids went one way and Kevin went another way to cover more ground but still we couldn't see her!! Once again we thought we were going to have to call it a day but then just as we were heading back after a total of 3.5 hours we found her! We measured her at 8 M which makes her around 704 years. We learned that it isn't easy finding a tree in a forest without a location so if anyone else would like to go visit her we now have a set of what three words to help you out. You can find her here: https://what3words.com/dignify.hippy.lengthen  

Nixie loved her and thought the part of her that had broken off looked like a triceratops winking its eye!