Thetford Forest - Location  

Maps and Location

Thetford Forest in Western Europe

East Anglia is an English region of lowland south-east Britain, consisting of the counties of Norfolk and Suffolk, also parts of Cambridgeshire and Essex. Overall the region is characterised as lowland - gently rolling to flat landscapes, a rural region, rich in mainly arable agriculture. A stereotypical view of the region would be one of unspoiled villages, separated by large fields of cereals, and sugarbeet, the landscape dotted by flint faced medieval church towers.

However, within the region are a variety of districts with their own special characteristics. The Fens for example, are one such district - a flat low lying area of peat-forming wetlands. Much of that district has been artificially drained to produce a rich black soils favoured by market gardeners.

The Brecks are another such East Anglian district - situated between the Fens to the west, and the heavier clay soils of the East Anglian Plateau to the east, the Brecks are characterised by their dry sandy soils that today support modern forestry, marginal arable farming, heathland, and USAF airfield bases.

Satellite View Kings Forest

Home Flake ID Guide Methodology Field walking Earthworks Finds gallery Prehistory Roman Site Medieval Site Waste Scatter Aerial Photos Archaeo-Blog Forest Photos The Surveyor Links Site Map

Contact me!

Guest Book

My Portal

Spam and Chips


This page last updated

2005-12-15
(y-m-d)

Paul Brooker
Thetford Forest seen from Google Earth

The image to the left is a satellite view of Thetford Forest from an elevation of 25 kilometres. You can click on the image to see a higher resolution view of the same image.

The Brecks

Thetford Forest is situated within a designated Environmentally Sensitive Area known as the Brecks or the Brecklands. The Brecks are spread across south west Norfolk, and parts of west Suffolk. Previous to the planting of the forest, much of the Brecks area consisted of heaths, sheepwalks, and rabbit warrens. Many of the excessively drained sandy soils of the area were unable to sustain arable farming during times of low corn prices. It was an area that suffered serious sand-blows during dry summers, as light soils blew across the area, covering villages, damaging river navigation, forming dunes. To counteract this problem, farmers began to plant the belts of scots pine trees between fields - a landscape feature that has become symbolic of the district.

Thetford Forest in the Breckland ESA

W.G. Clarke, an amateur naturalist and archaeologist, idealised this landscape in his definitive book of the area at that time - In Breckland Wilds, first published in 1925. However, landscape historians are now acutely aware that far from being an ancient unchanged landscape, much of Clarke's Breckland - an empty landscape of heaths, was a result of an agricultural decline during the proceeding century. As with other British landscapes, Brecklands landscape history is one of change. Afforestation, military training areas, and USAF airbases simply represent the most recent of those changes.

Thetford Forest

Thetford Forest is a 21,000 hectare pine forest that was planted in the Brecks area between the great wars of the 20th century. It was commissioned by a government, concerned that during times of war, Britain did not have a sustainable timber supply. Thetford Forest is a fine example of 20th century state-planning, with its neat rows and blocks of compartments - a landscape that the modern Forestry Commission is now slowly trying to break up into a more ascetic shape of curved and mixed compartments.

Consisting mainly of stands of corsican pine, Thetford Forest is Britain's largest lowland pine forest. Public access to much of the forest is good, and in order to encourage public recreation, it has been designated as a Forest Park.