Sunday 26 September 2010

Styal 26 Sept 2010

Four volunteers turned out and spent the day working on newly acquired land adjacent to the existing national trust property at Styal. The land has been bought to prevent unsympathetic development and to reunite parts of the wider estate that was held by the original mill owners.

They spent the day cutting down a conifers and bamboo plants. This and a certain amount of scrap wood resulted in a very hot bonfire.

Waiting for the fire to die down allowed a certain amount of time to "inspect" the new property.......

Sunday 19 September 2010

Daniel Hill nr Alderley Edge 19 Sept 2010

Six volunteers turned out on a damp morning and met up at the National Trust carpark near to the "wizard tea rooms". Three walked to Daneil hill, and three rode in the car with the tools.

We spent the day cutting and burning Rhodadendron towards the northeastern corner of the wood that crowns this hill. The fire lit fairly easily as we found a supply of dead (but not dry) twigs.
We also cleared some of the material left by a previous group of volunteers.

The weather improved over the course of the day, but the sun never really shone.

Sunday 12 September 2010

Hayfield 12 Sept 2010


Eight volunteers turned out and were transported to broad clough where we spent the day removing the lower branches from pine trees. The fate of these trees, like others in recent posts about work near ,Hayfield is to be used for gully blocking on the Kinder plateau though in this area the sequence of steps is slightly modified.... Removing the lower branches first makes it easier and faster to fell them...

These pines were originally a nursery crop they were supposed to just be there to help a variety of other broad leafed trees become established, however they have taken over and are shading out their charges. In the longer term - perhaps even later this year we may be returning to plant more native deciduous trees in this area - though the exact species mix is yet to be decided.

The weather was a little damp to start with but the sun came out in the afternoon - justifying the shorts worn by some of those present.

Tuesday 7 September 2010

White Nancy Walk 7 Sept 2010




After a rather stormy afternoon, the sun re-emerged to make for a perfect walk up White Nancy. The low sun intensified the colours, making the view over to Lyme Park particularly beautiful. We also had fun taking pictures of White Nancy, which has recently been re-whitewashed to cover over the England flag that appeared during the football World Cup. We made our decent back into Bollington just as the light was failing and enjoyed a drink (and Monster Munch, which took me back to my childhood) in the Poacher Inn on a comfy leather sofa.

Sunday 5 September 2010

Dunham Massey (Island pond) 5 Sept 2010

four volunteers in chest wadersFour volunteers turned out and donned waders ready to spend the day clearing Iris from Island pool in the deer park at Dunham Massey....

We don't barrow Iris up wet planks into the big trailer, which is quite tall - (see the last photo) - because of the danger of slips and falls. two in the pond - the warden answers his phone So the best way to fill the trailer is using the tractor's bucket. The disadvantage of this is that the warden has to be there to drive the tractor. Quite early on it became apparent that the warden would have to split his time between this and other tasks around the park, with calls arriving on a mobile phone even in the middle of the pond.

pond at the endTwo people cut the Iris into section with spades. The resulting material was loaded into bread baskets and dragged back to dry land along a line of planks more or less supported on the mat of floating iris. One plank disappeared quite quickly underwater - it was easy to walk on as long as you knew where it was!


trailer at the endSometimes a small team can achieve more than expected as it works efficiently. We cleared a significant area and transferred a lot of iris to the trailer. This was left by the pond for a few days to drain - and to give any hopping or crawling wildlife a chance to move back to the pond.