Rhododendron bashing at Hayfield on Sunday 20th October 2019

Autumn has properly arrived! As six volunteers gathered in Hayfield, hats were donned, warm breath vaporised in the cool morning air, and there was an eagerness to get going rather than stand around for too long.

 

And when Autumn arrives, it’s a good time to go rhody bashing. There’s nothing like some vigorous sawing to keep the limbs warm in the colder months of the year. In times past we’d have also had a roaring fire to toast ourselves next to, but due to constraints on today’s worksite, we’d only be piling up the cut material, leaving it to slowly rot down, rather than burning it.

 

Today we were continuing the ongoing clearance of rhododendron from Park Hall woods. We’ve already cut down large swathes throughout the wood, and really opened up the understorey. Today we were focussing on clearing a patch which encircled the base of some large trees, especially one extremely big mature beech, so that ranger Mark can get in to properly survey the base of the trees and monitor their health.

 

Before: lots of rhody, and the base of the beech tree in the background is impossible to inspect.

We spread out along the line of rhody growing below the trees and gradually made a few large piles of cut material. Despite having a relatively small group we were able to make very visible progress. By the end of the day we had cleared another large area of the woods, and most importantly, Mark is now able to carry out his tree surveys!

After: much clearer, with the beech tree now accessible.



A clear understorey with piles of cut rhody that will rot down.