Fifteen of us met Vicky, the Styal Ranger, in the Quarry Bank Mill car park today at 10am. Fortunately we'd all remembered that the hour went back and turned up at the correct time:-)
After a safety, tools and Covid talk, Vicky explained that there were two tasks, removing barb wire fencing and posts in preparation for tree planting, and then planting some trees. A tools talk was given to those that hadn't removed barb wire fencing before, and safety glasses distributed (just in case!). Everyone was so keen to get going that the barb wire was removed very quickly and wound round in coils to be stored for future re-use.
The posts were fast to follow, some 'snapping' because they were so rotten, whilst others taking a few of us to get them out, sometimes having to be almost dug out. Again, any that could be re-used later were kept separate from those that were rotten.
We stopped for a socially-distanced break mid-morning and Vicky and Sue went off to collect some tree's and canes. The canes were to be placed by the side of each tree after it had been planted so the location of each tree could still be identified once the meadow grass grew taller than the trees in the Spring. Using canes is a relatively new idea for the National Trust, instead of using plastic tree protectors which not only are made of plastic and therefore not ecological, they also need removing once the tree trunk has grown to a certain circumference, thereby increasing the work load. Although tree-guards made from recyclable material are being trialled, for now the cane seems the best option.
We returned with quite a variety of tree's to plant. Vicky gave a demonstration of how to plant them, each species (other than the oak) were to be planted in groups of 3 or 4 or 5 to make them look more natural when established and were to be planted 2 metres apart (this wasn't so the tree's are social-distancing, along with us!, more that it gives them enough space to get established before they are thinned out in future years).
Once the other species were planted, the oak would be used to infill the gaps between them.
Working in pairs, with one person digging the hole, then standing back while the other planted the tree and heeled it in, we'd planted most of them by lunchtime. Vicky collected, probably around 100 more trees and canes after lunch, including some different species.
We'd completely finished soon after 3pm and reckoned that we'd planted around 600 tree's between us. We loaded up Vicky's trailer and walked back to the car park to go home. It was great to do something 'constructive' for a change rather than the destructive rhody bashes and tree thinning that we often do because we love doing them.
On the whole, the weather was ok, mainly dry, although we had a bit of a shower but it resulted in a double rainbow, so no complaints there - to be honest, it was just fabulous to be outdoors, doing something useful and being able to socially-distantly chat to other people and share a laugh:-)
For interest, this is a list of the species planted: Pedunculate Oak, Crab apple, Scots pine, Hornbeam, Sweet chestnut, Hazel, Wych elm, Small leaved lime, Silver birch, Downy birch, Rowan and Aspen.
Thanks to Adrian for additional photo's.
