On the traineeship there are loads of opportunities to complete training courses that will provide the all-important skills for my future career in conservation. One I have most recently completed was chainsaw maintenance, cross cutting and felling small trees. Having had absolutely zero experience with anything chainsaw related, it’s safe to say that I was more than nervous to pick up a chainsaw and get going!

Before starting the training, myself and Meg had acted as banks people for Iain on a few occasions when he was having to fell trees (mainly unsafe ash trees due to dieback disease). He’d talked us through some of the things he was doing so I had some idea of the types of things we’d be learning throughout the training but there’s nothing like getting to do it yourself for it to make complete sense.

The first day was spent learning how to maintain our chainsaw, which turns out is pretty important! At first it was all a bit confusing for someone like me who’s not mechanically minded; when it came to taking it apart I was pretty convinced I’d end up putting it back together the wrong way! With a little practice, though, I soon started to get to grips with it. Taking care of the bar and chain is also super important, making sure it's well sharpened made all the difference when it came to starting to cut as we soon found out.

The rest of the training was a combination of cross cutting and felling. The first day didn’t start the best for me as I was having real difficulty in getting the saw started – unfortunately a key part to be able to fell a tree! After a quick pep talk to myself, I finally managed to get it going and the day soon improved. Thankfully, from then on I had no problems starting the saw, which I was grateful for. With that hurdle crossed it was on to cross cutting – this is done to cut the felled tree into pieces that are more easy to move, these are sometimes extracted for timber or can be left in log/brash piles to provide a good habitat for many species. Tension and compression of the tree is important here and this took a while for me to grasp but, after getting my saw trapped more times than I’d like to admit, I finally started to get the hang of it and now cross cutting is quite enjoyable!

Felling was next and it’s no secret that I really struggled with this! Watching someone else makes it look so simple – but it really isn’t, everything has to be done with such accuracy and it’s a lot harder than it looks! Firstly you need to do a ‘gob’ cut, which is placed in the direction you want the tree to fall - making sure it’s flat, both cuts meet up and are just the right size are important for this cut. Then onto the different types of back cuts. We learned a standard felling cut, a split level cut and a dog’s tooth – all different depending on the situation. It was massively frustrating when things didn’t go right and it's easy to put a lot of pressure on yourself, which didn’t help, but there’s nothing like the feeling of the cut going to plan and the noise of the tree hitting the ground to make up for the times where I wanted to give up. Fortunately, we were able to have a lot of practice ready for the assessment and by the time this came round I felt more confident that I could pass.

Much to my relief I managed to pass my chainsaw assessment and now hold a shiny new chainsaw licence. I must admit that it’s a great feeling and is another skill I can tick to say I have. At times I really doubted my ability to pass so I’m super proud of myself for getting through it - and the encouragement and support from everyone at the Trust really helped me believe in myself. Although felling season has come to an end, I will be looking forward to one day picking up a chainsaw again!

Lydia Rackham is following her dream of working in wildlife conservation after a change of career and a return to education.