Is the Hornbeam any blummin' use (for wildlife)?

[eeyore]

In my experience hornbeams also play a valuable role as sacrificial trees in woodland planting - that is if you are planting say a mixed ash / oak woodland if you put in maybe 10% hornbeam the deer and squirels bark strip them prefferentially and leave the oak and ash more or less unmollested.

once the oak and ash are established the hornbeam can either be dropped in the first 10-15year thin or ring barked (if any are left alive by that point) and left as standing dead wood - if you are removing it, it burns nicely once seasoned and is okay for woodwork , the one proviso being that its damn hard and blunts your tools more quickly than for example ash

[burhinus]

Two regular sites I go for Hawfinch, Clumber Park in Nottinghamshire and Lyndford Arboretum in Norfolk and where are the Hawfinch in the Hornbeam or picking up seeds from the ground. Long live the Hornbeam.