YOUR correspondent (Letters, July 2) may be surprised to learn that the owners of Fernhurst Wood are Blackburn Council.

Fernhurst Wood is designated as an 'ancient woodland' and a 'site of biological importance,' and is recognised as such in the council's own District Development Plan Topic Paper No 9 - The Natural Environment.

It is also a provisional county biological heritage site, again recognised in the Draft Borough of Blackburn Local Plan.

If your correspondent's observations of encroachment on the wood by local residents is indeed correct, then it is important that the council acts to stop it.

A CULVERHOUSE, Cavendish Street, Darwen.

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