Dig the Pit!

The great day arrived last week, when contractors moved in with big shiny yellow machines to dig out The Pit. Pit Common is one of the five sites comprising NWT Southrepps Commons, and despite the care and attention lavished on it in the past by Southrepps Commons Trust, Nature, in the form of Greater Reedmace, as the botanists know it, or Bulrushes to the rest of us, had completely choked it.

In earlier times, when there was still a creditable pond there, valiant efforts had been made to control the invading plants…

… but eventually defeat had to be conceded. It was with great relief that SCT could hand this problem over to Norfolk Wildlife Trust, which has quickly risen to the challenge. The strategy was to go back to square one: dig out the sludge accumulated since the last overhaul a decade or so ago, down to the clay bottom, trying not to go beyond. As well as the Reedmace, Common Reed had multiplied too much, and that pernicious invader Crassula helmsii had also seen fit to join the party. The effect of all this was that the pond had become dry throughout much of the year, and was no longer suitable for the wildlife that used to thrive there. It had also lost its attractive appearance.

Thanks are due to Team Leader Kevin for many of these pictures. Here is one of the diggers at work:

And here is one at rest:

The keen-eyed reader will have spotted a notice in these pictures. This was put there by NWT to warn the public about the presence of heavy machinery and to explain what the work is trying to achieve. (Is it permissible at this point to say this was heavy plant removing some slightly less heavy plants? No – Ed.)

The Pit can be enjoyed from the grassy area behind it, graced by two benches, but also from the road. That has been harder to appreciate recently, as so much vegetation had grown up at the roadside edge. Sporadic assaults on it with loppers, sickles, billhooks and suchlike medieval weaponry had been made, but the stuff will keep growing back and blocking the view. A JCB however, can sort it out in no time:

As mentioned above, the contractors were asked to go down to the clay bottom, but no further. It is now clear that some of the unwanted rhizomes are growing up through the clay, so some thought may need to be given to how they can be removed, if at all.

It is well understood that this is not a one-off job: the plants will recover, and in time choke the pond again, so fans of big yellow diggers will get another sighting in another decade or so.  Meanwhile, here is how it looks at the roadside at the time of writing. All it needs now is some water!

 Southrepps Commons Volunteers are not yet allowed to play about with big shiny yellow diggers, but their work continues nonetheless. The next working party is on Sunday 15^th, but as usual some preparatory work was necessary, so that that the eager volunteers can get straight down to work in the dim dawn light at 9.00 am. Your correspondent again has a note saying he can’t come to that fiesta of fun, but did manage to fall out of bed in time to help with the preparation session, which was unusually held almost a week before the main event, rather than the customary Saturday. Such a shame he was unaware that the start time had been moved forward an hour, but hey ho, it’s quite nice to turn up just in time to help with the clearing up and the convivial cup of tea and biscuit.