Balsam Day = Groundhog Day

 

The third in the seemingly never-ending series of “special” working parties to subdue the persistent efforts of Himalayan Balsam to dominate, if not the Universe, Southrepps Common at least, came round again today. And at an alarmingly early hour, the better to spare the Balsam Pickers the worst of the pitiless sun. In the event, the sun did display some pity, and it was actually a pleasant temperature. That’s partly because at 9.00 a.m. even the chorusing birds were still rubbing their bleary eyes.

Finding much news to pass on is actually a bit tricky, and your tireless tired correspondent is tempted to refer hopeful readers to the previous two postings for deathless prose and startling images. However, nothing daunted, we present to the world a bit more…

The session got off to a poor start for Team Leader Julie, who cycling along at a no doubt impressive speed, her cap blew off and lodged at the top of a tall hedge. A hedge taller than the said Team Leader, who was grateful to a passing pedestrian of more extended growth for plucking the errant headgear from its prickly landing place and returning it to its correct position on Julie’s head.

The day had got off to an even worse start, and indeed conclusion, for an unfortunate shrew, whose lifeless body lay on the boardwalk. I have no direct experience of this, but I believe that shrews are unpalatable, so we can assume that it was spat out by its disgusted killer; scant compensation for the shrew however.

We were only going to work for an hour, but the first quarter of that was used by a few of us in plucking out newly emerged small plants in the area we had cleared a fortnight before.

Further on, the going was a bit rough under foot!

A site has been established over the past few weeks for the dumping and decomposition of the removed plants, but with the reeds now so tall it’s elusive.

 

Here some intrepid explorers are trying to find it.

Moving on to the edge of Area A, we were out of the shadows and back in the sunlight. Here the Balsam was growing strong and thick.

Great care was needed, as this wretched plant insists on hiding itself amongst nettles and thistles, all of which seem to have it in for our crack team of super-weeders. Poor Sheila at least found plenty of nettles able to sneak in between her gloves and the bottom of her sleeves – ouch!

This was the area where we found a broad-bodied chaser dragonfly last time: this time it was a solitary Peacock butterfly caterpillar.

With the hour up, we convened at the dumping site to empty our heavily laden sacks. The pile has grown to enormous proportions. Contrary to what was said above in connection with the temporary loss of her cap, Team Leader Julie is in fact jolly tall, and the Balsam plant she is holding was a champion one (ahem)

On the way back out, we stopped to admire the central area. Your correspondent was snapped finding out why a fragrant orchid gets its name.

Here is that splendid orchid, which certainly does have a smell reminiscent of cloves.

Also in that area are good numbers of Marsh Helleborines:

That area is great for its flowers, and is currently dotted with many beautiful orchids. 

Here is Julie’s message of thanks:

Hi all

Hope everyone has made the most of the rain in their gardens! It was very welcome.

It was not noticeably wetter on the common this morning when 8 of us tackled the undergrowth in search of the elusive (I wish) Himalayan Balsam. It was still appearing in the area we had done before, albeit smaller ones but further round in the sun they were getting quite big. Easy to spot, but not easy to get to nestling deep in the nettle and sticky weed! 

However, a great job was done and yet again bags of uprooted Balsam were put on the dump site where the previous lot were already well rotted down.

We will be back in two weeks' time, though we may shift our attention to the area by the car park where they are starting to gain some height we believe!  We will let you know in due course.

Thanks once again to the hardy group that keep turning out to do this - it is very much appreciated.

Regards, Julie (for the TLs)