Footpath work Alderley Edge 29 July 2012

Five volunteers tuned out to Alderly edge and spent the day removing overhanging branches and opening up  foot paths

Balsam Bashing Dunham Massey 22 July 2012

Thankyou to Daniel for words

view into wood at lunch time - quite a clear pach

Eleven of us spent today in the sunshine at Dunham Massey uprooting Himalayan balsam from a stretch of riverbank beside the Bollin and in the wood near the Scout camp. In the wood we cleared an impressive 800 square metres! One advantage of the wet summer is that the ground in the wood was soft and the balsam, which are shallow-rooted plants, were easy to pull out. In places they had grown 8 feet tall! We separated the roots from the stems and piled the plants up. They will soon begin to rot down.

heap of Balsam

90 degree panorama of area cleared

Cotton Grass plant packing - ~Hayfield 15 July 2012

Thanks to Sue for the words.....

.. great day. Thirteen of our members joined with a dozen youngsters doing a Working Holiday as part of their DofE syllabus.

It was really nice to join with another group and chat to them while we were doing the work.

The weather was kind to us, a bit cloudy and cool in the shade but sunny at times and NO RAIN!!

We worked well together with Shane, his team and the Working Holiday leaders, loosening cotton plants that had become root bound in the trays they were stored in then stacking the plants into giant helibags so the helicopter could take them up to Kinder later in the week. The part filled helibags were placed on the trailer then filled to capacity before being driven to the side of the field where the helicopter pick them up.

I can't quite remember how many cotton plants there were (80,000?) but we completed the task in good time before re-grouping at the Sett Valley Trail carpark to get into our cars for the journey home.

camera and computer have decided not to talk to each other tonight so no photos yet!  Thanks to Nathan for the photos - camera still not talking.... - finally got the other photo to transfer....

Formby 8 July 2012

Eight of our volunteers turned out to Formby and met up with a number of others from the Merseyside group.


We spent a beautiful sunny day on the beach - sorting out a fence.  It was originally installed to keep people off a dune, with the aim of reducing erosion and eventually allowing nature (in the form of Marram grass) to stabilise the sand.  The dune has also been planted with dead Christmas trees to help trap and retain sand.

The sea had its own ideas - undermining the fence and the burying part of it in the beach.

First we recovered the materials (posts / rails and chestnut paling fence) out of the sand and then we re-erected the fence in a new position on the beach.  Where it will hopefully stand - protecting the face of the dune from some of the force of the sea and from scores of visiting feet.

Three of us took the opportunity to have a swim before we returned to Manchester.

thanks to Nathan for additional photos...

Dunham Massey 1 July 2012

Four volunteers turned out to Dunham Massey and spend the day in woodland outside the deer park "Balsam Bashing....   Almost exactly a year before we were in the same places for the same job see himalayan-balsam... a previous entry on this blog.

What a contrast......

Last year - sheltering in the woodland from blazing sun - this year sheltering from the drizzle!

Last year pulling up and breaking large stands of balsam - this year hunting through the woods finding very little balsam....  (Though someone possibly us will still need to go back an revisit the Rhodadendrons!)

We did find some balsam - though due to the weather it wasn't as easy to see as it has been last year -being smaller and not yet flowering - however the GOOD NEWS is it looks like this particular plant is now more or less under control in these particular parts of the estate.   It is too early to declare victory there will still be seed in the ground and birds / animals can still bring more in but the contrast was very gratifying to see.