Beeley wood, incorporating Great Hollins wood is classified as ancient woodland which means that the area has been continually wooded since at least 1600. A document for the 7th Earl of Shrewsbury, dated to somewhere between 1590-1616 lists Beeley Wood as a spring wood i.e. one used for coppicing. By 1898, the woodland management regime was changing and the Duke of Norfolk's forester intended to plant 60 acres of conifers within the woods. Legibility of the previous wooded landscape is partial. The boundaries have changed little since the 1st edition OS map of 1855 and it is likely that remnants of the coppicing regime can be identified within the woodland.