Pumped up and ready for action

 

Faithful followers of this Blog, if indeed there are any, may remember that last time your usual correspondent was almost as deflated as the tyre on our little green cart that had unreasonably burst following the injection of some (perhaps excessive?) much-needed air. Careful examination of the other tyres on that vital vehicle by the Southrepps Commons Volunteers Maintenance Department (John and John) revealed that the three remaining tyres were not far away from going pop too. You won’t be surprised to learn that replacements of such specialist items are hard to track down, but after much research a set of four was procured with the clock ticking; we desperately needed the trolley to be back in use at the next session. After monumental struggles the new tyres were fitted, and at the start of this latest working party the tools were loaded onto the waiting trolley and off it trundled. It trundled very well, the air in the tyres making light work of movement. Sadly, it had forgotten how to steer; it was again useless. The Maintenance Department investigated, and discovered that something important in the sophisticated mechanism had become bent, or broken; not requiring more air or blu-tack it had gone beyond my competence. So let’s hope the ability to control the direction it goes in can be restored in time for our next working party.

The task this time was to clear the grass and reeds from the smaller part of the central area (known as Area G) on the southern side of the boardwalk. Grizzly Driver John had cut the stuff a few days before, and reports that it had been so verdant that in carving out his first strip he lost his bearings. Classically, explorers wore pith helmets, but perhaps someone had taken his. Here’s how the site looked after his efforts.

This time 23 volunteers came along; seven more than the previous record for this season. As has been well documented, when visitors descend on your usual correspondent, he uses this as an excuse to skive off, often for a month, the better to recuperate. Team Leader Margaret is cut from different cloth however, and a visiting family of five accompanied her to the working party. Happily, they seemed to enjoy it, as did the rest of us. Here’s the busy and bucolic scene.

Such was the richness of our human resources, we had enough people to not only heap the drag sheets high and winch them to the dumping site, but also to clear up after the brush cutting crew, who cut brush with gusto. At this time of year the vegetation bordering the boardwalk does its best to grow across it and meet in the middle, which is not fun for anyone trying to use it, especially after heavy rain, so efforts to trim it back are essential.

Here they are again, with in the background two adventurers on the larger side of the boardwalk, hunting down and eliminating reeds one by one, in order to delay the need for mowing so that the flowering plants can get on with flowering.

The well-renowned winch crew were at their astonishing best, hauling in sheet after sheet of heavily loaded material, and creating a mountain of vegetation ready to quietly decay over the next 12 months (I mean the vegetation of course).

Here they are examining the winch, trying to work out which way is up.

We were fortunate that the weather was almost ideal for this work: not too warm, no rain, and a breeze that was no more than pleasantly cooling. Nonetheless, when half time came and the refreshments were available, the field was abandoned.

Here is the obligatory group photo of refreshed volunteers.

A considerable spider was discovered on Team Leader Margaret’s back. It looks like a particularly well-fed Orb Web Garden Spider to me, but I am no arachnologist, so am ready to stand corrected. Rest assured, the spider was safely returned to the ground, and there was no unseemly shrieking (spiders don't shriek).

The area concerned is not large, but even so, the amount of vegetation to be removed is considerable; it would be fascinating to know the weight of the amount we shifted. It usually takes a couple of sessions to complete the task, but with the turnout being so good, and a willingness to carry on working for a while past the official end time, the whole lot was cleared in one hit – something the old hands don’t remember being achieved previously. The old hands in this picture are smiling broadly because it’s the load they have been looking for all morning – the final one.

And these two ladies are either engaged in rolling up a drag sheet at the end of the session, or praying for that end to come.

Here’s how the area looked like at the end of the session, ready to start growing all over again.

Here is Team Leader Julie’s message of thanks:

Dear Volunteers

We hope that you are all keeping well.

We wanted to say a massive thankyou to today's volunteers for a great job done on the Central area to the rear of Chadwick Bench.

The area had been pre-cut along with a stretch on the other side of the boardwalk and this was all cleared. Everyone was so efficient at loading the reed onto the sheets we had a queue of them to be dragged and emptied - but it gave everyone a chance to stop and chat for a while! We ran slightly over the two-hour time allowed, so an extra thanks to everyone for staying to complete the task.  

As we had a good turn out today it allowed us to take a few people off to clear the boardwalk edges from the bench along to the Bradfield Road spur. So thanks also go to the operators of brushcutters, brooms, loppers and saws! We still have more to do on the edges but a good start was made today.

Finally, thanks go to the crazy ones that were hand weeding reed from the central area in front of the bench to allow the wildflowers to flourish.

A very productive work party today.

Regards, Julie (for the team leaders)