Five intrepid volunteers set off to Formby for the day, four car sharing from Styal.
We were working on a field near the Rangers station. The field had recently been cleared of gorse by contractors using heavy machinery. The forecast promised rain, but instead we got mainly rainbows. You can just about see the rainbow, you can also see the cleared field.
They have plans for the area:
.jpg)
The task for the day was hedge laying and clearing brambles ...
... so we split into groups and rotated the tasks. Nathan, the new Ranger at Formby, was on hand to help with the hedge laying. We had a wide range of sharp tools for the hedge laying - one- and two-handed bill hooks and axes. It was interesting to try the different methods.
The laid hedge was woven between stakes knocked in the ground. When the tree had branches that would have been higher than the hedge we put a second bend in the branch:
At the end of the day we had laid down a few more trees.
The experienced hedge layers amongst you will notice the stumps sticking up. They will be cut off later by chainsaw so water doesn’t collect and rot the stump. You might also recognise this as a Staffordshire lay. Different counties have their own styles.
The tractor was used to take all the brash back to the Rangers station for burning. We managed to clear quiet a large tangle of brambles from under a tree:
On the way back we saw a few more rainbows, this one was by Manchester airport.
Jenny
No comments:
Post a Comment