In direct response to Jane Pearson’s letter ‘destruction of heathland’ in the Echo last Thursday, March 27, she has misinterpreted what our management work is aiming to achieve. Dorset Wildlife Trust recognises gorse scrub as being an important constituent of the Dorset heaths which also provides habitats for a range of invertebrates and birds such as the Dartford warbler.

Gorse scrub if left unmanaged, as with many other shrubs as gardeners will know, becomes leggy and slowly degenerates. But with occasional coppicing it will provide fresh young and bushy regrowth – a much better habitat for birds and insects.

The effects of burning also aids the germination of gorse seeds. Indeed one of the reasons why the Dartford warbler be-came almost extinct in Britain in the early 1960s was attributed to the lack of gorse management, resulting in most of the gorse being in a poor degenerate state so providing it little in the way of food and shelter.

One only needs to read Thomas Hardy and his mention of furze-cutters to realise that gorse on the Dorset heaths was frequently cut over many centuries and this has not lead to its disappearance.

Robert Brunt, Head of Land Management, Dorset Wildlife Trust