VITAL management work has started at Bricket Wood Common, to help enhance and conserve its special wildlife.

The work, a five-year project, which started on Monday, February 4, is carried out on behalf of organisations working in partnership to look after the common.

A conservation spokesman explained Bricket Wood Common was designated as a "site of special scientific interest" (SSSI) in recognition of its ancient woodland and heathland habitats.

And said the main part of the work would involve the widening of "rides" (linear strips of open space such as bridleways) that pass through the Common.

This work would create a new band of coppice and a band of tall vegetation between the woodland and open space.

Ms Gill Keely, landscape and countryside officer for St Albans and District Council has been overseeing the management of the Common on behalf of the owner.

She said: "None of the woodland remaining in the UK today is completely natural, but has all been managed by man. The evidence for this can be seen in Bricket Wood Common.

"The common has been created by thousands of years management, and now needs to continue this management sensitively to conserve and develop the special rare species on the site for long-term future. This is being realised through a schedule of work which has been prepared by the partners involved to manage the site over a five-year period."

Ms Keeley explained heathland work to restore areas which had become overgrown by birch trees in recent years would also also be undertaken.

She said Hertfordshire's heathland was particularly threatened as over 90 per cent of it had been lost in the past 60 years.

"The habitat supports many increasingly rare species and this work is the next step in returning this habitat to the common.

Future work will involve the gradual management of the woodland areas over a long-term scale."

For more information, contact The Trees and Woodlands Officer at St Albans City and District Council on 01727 819363.