West Wood is a biological

Site of Special Scientific Interest A Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI) in Great Britain or an Area of Special Scientific Interest (ASSI) in the Isle of Man and Northern Ireland is a conservation designation denoting a protected area in the United Kingdom and Isle of ...

Little Sampford Little Sampford is a village and a civil parish on the B1053 road, in the Uttlesford district, in the county of Essex, England. The population of the civil parish at the 2011 Census was 251. Until the 18th century the ecclesiastical parish was kn ...

, north of

Thaxted Thaxted is a town and civil parish in the Uttlesford district of north-west Essex, England. The town is in the valley of the River Chelmer, not far from its source in the nearby village of Debden, and is 97 metres (318 feet) above sea level (whe ...

in northwestern

Essex Essex () is a county in the East of England. One of the home counties, it borders Suffolk and Cambridgeshire to the north, the North Sea to the east, Hertfordshire to the west, Kent across the estuary of the River Thames to the south, and G ...

. It is owned and managed by the Essex Wildlife Trust. The site is ancient woodland on chalky boulder clay and sandy

loam Loam (in geology and soil science) is soil composed mostly of sand (particle size > ), silt (particle size > ), and a smaller amount of clay (particle size < ). By weight, its mineral composition is about 40–40–20% concentration of sand–sil ...

. It was mainly

elm Elms are deciduous and semi-deciduous trees comprising the flowering plant genus ''Ulmus'' in the plant family Ulmaceae. They are distributed over most of the Northern Hemisphere, inhabiting the temperate and tropical-montane regions of North ...

, but this has died and the wood regenerated naturally with

ash Ash or ashes are the solid remnants of fires. Specifically, ''ash'' refers to all non-aqueous, non- gaseous residues that remain after something burns. In analytical chemistry, to analyse the mineral and metal content of chemical samples, ash ...

, and there is also some field maple and hornbeam. Bramble and

dog's mercury ''Mercurialis perennis'', commonly known as dog's mercury, is a poisonous woodland plant found in much of Europe as well as in Algeria, Iran, Turkey, and the Caucasus, but almost absent from Ireland, Orkney and Shetland.oxlip ''Primula elatior'', the oxlip (or true oxlip), is a species of flowering plant in the family Primulaceae, native to nutrient-poor and calcium-rich damp woods and meadows throughout Europe, with northern borders in Denmark and southern parts of ...

and meadow-sweet. There are many species of birds and butterflies, and four ponds which have

great crested newts The northern crested newt, great crested newt or warty newt (''Triturus cristatus'') is a newt species native to Great Britain, northern and central continental Europe and parts of Western Siberia. It is a large newt, with females growing up to ...

, dragonflies and

damselflies Damselflies are flying insects of the suborder Zygoptera in the order Odonata. They are similar to dragonflies, which constitute the other odonatan suborder, Anisoptera, but are smaller and have slimmer bodies. Most species fold the wings along ...

. There is access by a footpath from the

B1051 road B roads are numbered routes in Great Britain of lesser importance than A roads. See the article Great Britain road numbering scheme The Great Britain road numbering scheme is a numbering scheme used to classify and identify all roads in G ...

between Thaxted and

Great Sampford Great Sampford is a village and civil parish on the junction of the B1053 and B1051 roads in the north-west of the English county of Essex. The population of the civil parish at the 2011 Census was 586. The village includes a primary school, ...

References

{{coord, 51.974, 0.357, type:landmark_region:GB, display=title Sites of Special Scientific Interest in Essex Essex Wildlife Trust