The borough boasts a wide range of woodlands which, as well as supporting a great diversity of wildlife, provide attractive walks for both residents and visitors alike.

Kings Wood, Challock

Top of the list for a visit should be Kings Wood at Challock, where an "Arts in the Environment" project reflects the living landscape in a creative way. Kings Wood, a coppiced ancient woodland which was once the hunting ground of King Henry VIII, is now the site of an exciting arts project. It features sculptures which draw on the natural landscape and materials and creates art which works with the countryside rather than imposing upon it. A three mile "green route" not only takes in the art works, but also reveals the full beauty of the wood itself and links into other walks including the shorter "brown route".

The sheer size of the wood, 1,500 acres, means that wildlife such as deer, badgers, owls and foxes can all live without too much disturbance from visitors and woodmen.

All of the art works have been produced by international artists during annual residencies. Sculptures such as Andy Frost's colourful and imaginative picnic tables and benches have been inspired by the birds, animals and vegetation of the woods.

Another piece of work by Emily Allchurch is a sculpture with a function. It requires the viewer to participate in its existence by walking through it, and in wet weather it serves a practical purpose by providing a dry walkway over what would otherwise be a muddy part of the woodland.

Ham Street Woods

This remnant of a much larger Ice Age forest still provides timber and is a haven for wildlife. An oak canopy shades hazel and sweet chestnut, while a layer of bluebells, campions and yellow archangel make the woodland floor a mass of colour in spring. Nightingales and redstarts are elusive summer visitors.

The woodland in Ham Street Woods is said to be more than 400 years old. Located six miles from Ashford, near to Hamstreet and Ruckinge, the site is on the escarpment of the old Saxon shoreline, and indeed part of the Saxon Shore Way runs through the woods. Plants such as bluebell, primrose (Primula vulgaris) and wood anemone (Anemone nemorosa) flourish, and plants of open areas such as goldenrod (Solidago virgaurea) and heath cudweed (Gnaphthalium sylvaticum) colonise the coppiced wood.

You can see many breeding birds on the reserve, including treecreeper, spotted flycatcher and redpoll, with nightingale, hawfinch and sparrowhawk often present too.

The woods support a large number of rare invertebrates, most notably species living on deadwood and butterflies such as the Duke of Burgundy fritillary.

The site is also of archaeological interest and contains many well-preserved earthworks for you to view, including a medieval ditch and bank system and the remains of a staggered medieval dam. The area is also a National Nature Reserve.

Access: Ham Street and Orlestone Woods are located just off of the A2070 heading from Ashford towards Ham Street.  See a google map.

Orlestone Forest

This large complex of woodland is a designated Forest Nature Reserve with conservation its main objective. The 800 acre wood supports nationally-important moth and butterfly populations.

Orlestone Forest is nationally regarded as one of the most important conservation area for invertebrates (mainly insects) in the UK. This large ancient woodland site near Ham Street is home to several hundred invertebrate species, including 39 nationally rare species and 134 nationally scarce species. Several species are known to only exist in Orlestone Forest.

Park Wood (Great Heron Wood)

This smaller woodland provides an ideal location for a pleasant ramble through broadleaved woodland and conifers and past numerous ponds. There are classic ancient woodland banks with layered hornbeam trees which in places frame attractive views of the surrounding countryside. This is a good site for enjoying the songs of the nightingale, blackcap and garden warbler.

Charing Beech Hangers

Both the North Downs Way circular walk and the sycamore-lined Pilgrims Way are way marked through the sweet chestnut coppice, yew and beech woods that make up this woodland complex. The wood experienced the full force of the 1987 "hurricane" and the storm damage left openings which have been seized upon by a number of wild plants including orchids, wild thyme and marjoram.

The Warren

Situated close to the centre of Ashford and surrounded by roads and a railway, the Warren is ideally located to meet the leisure needs of an expanding urban population. Covering an area of around 38 hectares, the site is a complex of wet meadow pasture, acid grassland, woodland ponds, secondary oak woodland, a disused quarry, chestnut coppice and former pasture. The tree species within these habitats include oak, sweet chestnut, silver birch, ash, rowan, and sycamore. Among these, there are some fine veteran and ancient oaks and sweet chestnuts. Along with the acid grassland area, the veteran and ancient trees provide the greatest wildlife value on the site. The Warren is also important for wildlife. The acid grasslands are unimproved, and contain plants such as sheep's sorrel and bird's foot. The ponds are home to amphibians, aquatic insects and the uncommon water violet. A wide variety of birds also inhabit the site.

Access: Via Warren Lane (turning off A292 Maidstone Road). There is ample parking and a network of way-marked paths through the site starting from the car park.