Extensive grassy lawn popular area for picnicing or playing games, also adjoining woodland with marked trails.

The Bag it and Bin it’ scheme has been introduced following a survey of dog walkers that highlighted the amount of poo that dogs leave on the forest and a shortage of places to put it. Now six areas of the forest that came out as favourite dog walking spots – Wilverley, Godshill Cricket, Deerleap, Longslade Bottom, Linford Bottom and Dibden Inclosure – will all be kitted out with litter bins. The dog waste can be put in these bins, providing it is plastic wrapped.
Earlier this year, England Marketing, on behalf of the Forestry Commission’s PROGRESS project, sent out 6,000 surveys to random households across the National Park area to gauge the opinions of both dog owners and non-dog owners about dog walking in the forest.
The survey shows that 39% of local residents own one or more dogs, almost double the national average of 22%1. Based on these figures there are around 27,000 dog-owning households in the area with an estimated 37,000 dogs.
About 75% of dog owners walk their dogs at least once per day on the forest. 68% of people walk one dog, while others walk two or more and average walks last for around two hours.
Considering the number of dogs owned and the frequency of walks, the study reports that about 25,000 dogs are walked in the area at least once a day. Taking into account the pattern of dog walking and the various sizes of dogs, the survey concludes that approximately 9.5 tonnes of faeces are deposited in the forest each day, equivalent to 3,500 tonnes per year – the same weight as 240 double decker buses.
Forestry Commission 27-10-2005