TE10: Coppicing bankside trees

This item is part of Capital Grants 2025. You must read the Capital Grants 2025 guidance to understand the rules and how to apply.

If you’re applying for this item as part of a Countryside Stewardship Higher Tier (CSHT) application, you must read the CSHT applicant’s guide to understand the rules and how to apply.

How much you’ll be paid

£53.95 per tree.

How this item benefits the environment

Coppicing of bankside trees improves their longevity. It provides valuable habitat and habitat corridors in river valley and wetland landscapes. In the right location, it can help:

• increase the amount of light reaching the river
• stabilise riverbanks
• stabilise ditch banks

Where you can use this item

You can use this item on trees growing on or within 5 metres (m) of a streamside or riverbank. The trees cannot be currently managed under a regular coppicing programme.

What you must do to use this item

You must :

• coppice trees between 1 September and 1 March
• cut trees between 7.5 centimetres (cm) and 15cm above ground level
• encourage re-group by protecting cut stools from livestock, deer and rabbits
• control the growth of nettle, thistle, dock, ragwort and other weed species
• only use spot treatment or weed wiping when applying herbicides

Evidence you must keep

You must keep photographs of the completed work and provide them with your claim.

You must also keep and provide on request:

• any consents or permissions connected with the work
• receipted invoices or bank statements where a receipted invoice is unavailable
• photographs of the trees you plan to coppice

Read the record keeping and site visit requirements in the Agreement holder’s guide: Capital Grants, Higher Tier capital grants and Protection and Infrastructure grants for more information.

If you’re applying for this item as part of a Countryside Stewardship Higher Tier (CSHT) application, read the record keeping and site visit requirements in the CSHT agreement holder’s guide.

Advice to help you use this item

The following advice may help you to use this item, but you do not have to follow it to get paid. It’s not part of this item’s requirements.

Picking the right location

Use this item for individual or small groups of trees along a streamside or riverbank.

It can be used to either bring trees into a coppicing programme or for the selection of single stems to grow on to become mature trees.

Consider the short-term impact on the ecology, and visual impact on the landscape when determining the percentage of trees to be coppiced along any stretch of watercourse.

How to manage the coppicing

Angle cuts away from the centre of the crown when coppicing to allow water to run off.

The cut material can either be safely stacked in piles on the site or secured (using biodegradable fixings) in the channel as large woody material. Alternatively remove it from site if it is likely to cause an issue if moved by flood waters.

Aim to manage trees along a streamside or riverbank in rotation over several years. There should be some mature woody growth that is providing habitat and potentially dappled shade to the river channel.

It’s important to maintain a balance between light and shade to a river and stream. A ratio of 60% open water to 40% dappled shade represents a reasonable balance in most situations. Chalk streams are generally more open than this and rivers and streams in wooded landscapes may be more shaded.