Holly Wood is a biological
Site of Special Scientific Interest north-east of
Oxford
Oxford () is a city in England. It is the county town and only city of Oxfordshire. In 2020, its population was estimated at 151,584. It is north-west of London, south-east of Birmingham and north-east of Bristol. The city is home to the Un ...
in
Oxfordshire.
This ancient wood is a small remnant of the medieval
Royal Forest
A royal forest, occasionally known as a kingswood (), is an area of land with different definitions in England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland. The term ''forest'' in the ordinary modern understanding refers to an area of wooded land; however, the ...
of
Shotover. It is
coppice with standards
Coppicing is a traditional method of woodland management which exploits the capacity of many species of trees to put out new shoots from their stump or roots if cut down. In a coppiced wood, which is called a copse, young tree stems are repeat ...
on
Oxford Clay
The Oxford Clay (or Oxford Clay Formation) is a Jurassic marine sedimentary rock formation underlying much of southeast England, from as far west as Dorset and as far north as Yorkshire. The Oxford Clay Formation dates to the Jurassic, specifical ...
with a varied invertebrate fauna. There are several uncommon butterfiles such as the
black hairstreak and
purple emperor.
References
{{SSSIs Oxfordshire
Sites of Special Scientific Interest in Oxfordshire