The history of The Meads Community Woodland

Canterbury Archaeological Trust excavations in the nearby Jenny Wren and Sonora Estate area in 2008 revealed evidence for Neolithic, Bronze Age and Anglo-Saxon activity, including a group of Beaker period burials, a Bronze Age ring-ditch (almost certainly the remains of a round barrow) and an extensive Anglo-Saxon cemetery. An aerial photograph showed a cropmark of a sizable ring-ditch was in fact a large circular enclosure ditch of a henge. Measuring some 30m in diameter, the enclosure encompassed several features in its interior, the most striking of which were two concentric groups of post-holes situated at the centre. Probably dating to the late Neolithic period (3,000 to 4,800 years ago), this henge is the first to be confirmed and excavated in the Swale area.

Pastureland and orchards surrounded the woodland up to 300 years ago and when brickworks began operating nearby the surface level reduced. London ash would have been brought in and raised the surface in the C20. The majority of the woodland, as we see it today, was planted in the late 1990’s with a remaining older hedge and Poplar wind shelter.