Twyford Wood, formerly known as Twyford Forest, is a commercial wood around in

Lincolnshire Lincolnshire (abbreviated Lincs.) is a county in the East Midlands of England, with a long coastline on the North Sea to the east. It borders Norfolk to the south-east, Cambridgeshire to the south, Rutland to the south-west, Leicestershire ...

owned by the

Forestry Commission The Forestry Commission is a non-ministerial government department responsible for the management of publicly owned forests and the regulation of both public and private forestry in England. The Forestry Commission was previously also respon ...

, England, an agency of the British Government and managed by its subsidiary,

Forest Enterprise Forestry England is a division of the Forestry Commission, responsible for managing and promoting publicly owned forests in England. It was formed as Forest Enterprise in 1996, before devolving to Forest Enterprise England on 31 March 2003 and ...

(England).

History

A woodland had existed before the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

, covering approximately . During the war, much of the land beyond this was developed from 1943 onwards as

RAF North Witham Royal Air Force North Witham or more simply RAF North Witham is a former Royal Air Force station located in Twyford Wood, off the A1 between Stamford and Grantham, Lincolnshire, England about north-northwest of London. The site opened in 1943 ...

. This was used operationally by the United States

USAAF The United States Army Air Forces (USAAF or AAF) was the major land-based aerial warfare service component of the United States Army and ''de facto'' aerial warfare service branch of the United States during and immediately after World War II ...

. At the end of air hostilities in Europe, the USAAF handed the site back to the

Royal Air Force The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the United Kingdom's air and space force. It was formed towards the end of the First World War on 1 April 1918, becoming the first independent air force in the world, by regrouping the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) and ...

, who used the site as a bomb-collection dump, from which ordnance was then dispatched for disposal. At the end of hostilities of the Second World War, the woodland and RAF site were taken over by the Forestry Commission in 1945. In the 1950s, they redeveloped all of their woodlands holdings in the

River Trent The Trent is the Longest rivers of the United Kingdom, third-longest river in the United Kingdom. Its Source (river or stream), source is in Staffordshire, on the southern edge of Biddulph Moor. It flows through and drains the North Midland ...

valley with Scots and

Corsican pine ''Pinus nigra'', the Austrian pine or black pine, is a moderately variable species of pine, occurring across Southern Europe from the Iberian Peninsula to the eastern Mediterranean, on the Anatolian peninsula of Turkey, Corsica and Cyprus, as wel ...

for use by local industry, leaving the original ''

Quercus robur ''Quercus robur'', commonly known as common oak, pedunculate oak, European oak or English oak, is a species of flowering plant in the beech and oak family, Fagaceae. It is a large tree, native plant, native to most of Europe west of the Caucasus ...

'' oaks on the original woodland in place. The name ''Twyford'' comes from the former medieval village of that name, south of

Colsterworth Colsterworth is a village and civil parish in the South Kesteven district of Lincolnshire, England, less than half a mile (0.8 km) west of the A1, about south of Grantham, and north-west of Stamford. The village with the hamlet of Woolsthorp ...

, Note: there is a similarly named surviving village at SK728103

Present

Managed commercially today by

(England), the commercial woodland lies one mile to the east of

. To the south i
Beaumont Wood

Soil and geology

The

soil Soil, also commonly referred to as earth or dirt, is a mixture of organic matter, minerals, gases, liquids, and organisms that together support life. Some scientific definitions distinguish ''dirt'' from ''soil'' by restricting the former te ...

association is 712g Ragdale. Chalky till; slowly permeable seasonally waterlogged clayey and fine loamy over clayey soil. Boulder clay over upper Lincolnshire limestone.

Nature conservation

The butterfly reserves are managed by the Lincolnshire branch of

Butterfly Conservation Butterfly Conservation (BC) is a UK-wide nonprofit environmentalist organization and charity dedicated to conserving butterflies, moths, and the environment. The charity uses its research to provide advice on how to conserve and restore butterfly ...

. It is home to the

dingy skipper The Dingy Skipper (''Erynnis tages'') is a butterfly of the family Hesperiidae. Description ''Erynnis tages'' is different from other skippers because of the predominantly monochrome, gray-brown wing coloration and the marbling, which is only ...

and the

grizzled skipper ''Pyrgus'' is a genus in the skippers butterfly family, Hesperiidae, known as the grizzled skippers. The name "checkered" or "chequered skipper" may also be applied to some species, but also refers to species in the genera '' Burnsius'' and '' ...

Facilities

There is a small car park, with access from the A151. The wood is used for off-road motor sport.Motor sport
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References

* Ordnance Survey. (several maps) *

Bruce Barrymore Halpenny Bruce Barrymore Halpenny (1937 – 3 May 2015) was an English people, English military historian and author, specialising in airfields and aircraft, as well as ghost stories and mysteries. He was also a Television presenter, broadcaster''Framlin ...

''Action Stations 2.'' (1991) {{ISBN, 1-85260-405-0. * Soil Survey of England and Wales. Sheet 4. (1983) * Institute of Geological Sciences. One-Inch Series, Sheet 143.)

External links

Forestry Commission

The Tardis and Twyford Wood

News items

Lincolnshire Police in November 1997
Forests and woodlands of Lincolnshire South Kesteven District Motorsport venues in England