*CANCELLED* workday at Hardcastle Crags on Sunday 23rd February 2020

Today's tree planting at Hardcastle Crags was cancelled because nobody signed up.  Perhaps people were put off by the wet weather forecast and early start (9:30).

Collecting and chopping wood at Lyme Park on Sunday 16th February 2020

The work programme said we were off to Biddulph today, but Storm Dennis had other ideas and the task of planting whips at Biddulph had to be postponed.  Not to be put off by some wind and rain Ally phoned round and found a task for us to do in the bad weather.  Chris and Craig at Lyme asked if we could help clear up some branches that had been cut from the oaks near the picnic area and car park and chop some firewood.

We were reminded how dangerous the wet and slippy ground can be when the Ranger was called away to help rescue a lady who had slipped and broken her ankle.  He stayed with her until the ambulance arrived to take care of her.

When we finished loading we made use of the picnic tables for our morning break. Refreshed, we made our way up to the kennels to find some wood to chop.  We found a little more than we could do in one day, but we had a good go.

By the end of the day we had added two more ceiling high stacks of chopped oak to the wood store.  The oak will take three years to season ready to burn in the houses on the estate.

The Rangers were busy controlling the water levels around the estate because of all the rain we had had on Saturday.  Luckily, contrary to the weather forecast, we had very little rain on the day and even had a little sunshine.  We returned home with the satisfaction of another day's volunteering completed and friendships renewed.

Jenny

*CANCELLED* workday at Styal on Sunday 9th February 2020

Today's workday at Styal was cancelled due to Storm Ciara.

Various tasks at Formby on Sunday 2nd Feb 2020

A quartet of hardy MNTVers travelled to Formby on a surprisingly fine day to work with rangers Will and Izzie and ten members of the Merseyside NT Volunteers; we split into two groups to work on multiple tasks. The area is very popular, especially with dog walkers, and our job for the morning was to improve access from one of the car parks to the sea. The rangers had already scraped off the top layer of a wind blown path so we hauled a mixture of sand and stones to relay the surface.

Working on the path...

The mixture was then tamped down with a roller to make it weather resilient. A total of 100 tons of material will be needed to complete the job.

...and after it's been tamped down.

In the afternoon we carried out mitigation work the National Trust needs to do to balance the installation of a pay and display car park. We used ‘tree poppers’ to grub out planted poplar trees from amongst the native dog rose. The aim of the project is to create a mosaic environment to enhance the conservation value of the area.

Even though there were only four of us, the fact we were able to work alongside the Merseyside group enabled us to achieve visible progress.

Text and photo's from Jean