earning a small income from our woodland???

[smojo]

As far as I know (and that's not a lot yet) income from timber is free of tax as long as it's sold as timber. So once you make something with it, it becomes taxable. I'm wondering about how to make a few ££s too eventually just to cover running costs and not involve the taxman. Most of the timber I will have will be small diameter stuff from sycamore thinnings and re-coppicing hazel, probably not big enough to mill into planks so I'm trying to think of some saleable products that can still be classed as un-processed. I'm thinking some of my small round stuff might be saleable to wood-workers, either green or seasoned. Hazel rods for hurdle makers and gardeners as bean poles. All those things should be tax free income.

[oldclaypaws]

A summary of woodland tax regulations here for insomniacs;

http://www.upm-tilhill.com//file-bank/Taxation%20Guide%20Update.pdf

You could do worse than a chat with the self assessment help line to explore options and implications if concerned, they are knowledgeable and advice is free.

I doubt the revenue are that fussed though about modest revenues such as firewood, walking sticks and hobby craft items, they are too busy chasing celebrities with tax avoidance schemes to worry about your odd hurdles, fishing priests or bunches of mistletoe. Its pocket money and hardly being a criminal mastermind to stick a few odd quid aside to cover other costs, woodland seldom pays good income. If you had a commercial shoot or full time activity based business selling a service it would be different.

[Meadowcopse]

Interestingly, page 2 of the UPM Tilhill download states:

No income tax relief is available for the cost of assets used in forestry, nor any woodland expenditure, nor interest on loans for the purchase and or management of woodlands.

This is exactly an area I was interested in.
I've been employed on PAYE and simultaneously self-employed in an unrelated area to my main job in the past, and keeping things absolutely and demonstrably straight with book-keeping (especially on areas of overlap / dual use), stopped a potential query by HMRC in its tracks (and in a round about way confirmed a malicious source to the origins of their query (but that's messy divorces for you...)

More positively, present activities potentially see a significant expansion from not quite commercial orchard and conservation area, to woodland activities bordering on small-scale forestry (resulting in processed and unprocessed products) - and with a low impact non-forestry aspect on the plot that may give an income. (There may still be an unrelated PAYE aspect for a while too).

It's the overlap ofexpense activities with similar tools and equipment for management that might grey things if looked at from the wrong angle.
However, not declaring the expenditure and income isn't a long-term solution.
(I feel cheeky enough to put tuition fees for an ecology college course down as legitimate expense though)...

In some ways I'm fortunate that capital expenditure items like plant, machinery and larger tools already overlap (and exist) as part of my meadow conservation and orchard activities without having to acquire much.

[Ryder]

Are there any regulations related to running a business in the woods which is not directly related to forestry?

For example, if you run a few courses throughout the year like bushcraft, on a commercial basis, hoping to earn atleast say around £5000, would you need some sort of permission, or be registered as a real business, or inform planning or anyone else? Or can you just do the courses and inform the tax man at the end of the year?