Happy 30th birthday to us!

MNTV had its inaugural meeting on 21 April 1986 at Altrincham Library and signed up 35 members.  Who'd have thought that 30 years later we'd be as active as ever?  It makes me wonder how many acres of rhody we have bashed, how many miles of hedges we have laid and how many miles of fences we have built in that time... plus how many hundreds of thousands of pounds' worth of time we have given to the Trust.

The longevity of the group is testament to the enthusiasm of generations of members, the unwavering support of rangers at the properties where we volunteer, the many committees over the years who have kept the group running smoothly and all the worksite leaders who have coordinated the hundreds of workdays.

Eleven of us met at the Ship Inn, Styal for a meal and drinks to celebrate.  No founder members were present (we will see some at the 30th birthday party on 11 June) but Hazel Pryor was with us and is almost a founding member.  She remembers the advert in the Altrincham newspaper for the inaugural meeting.  Hazel first went out with the group on the Morville Hall, Shropshire weekend in September 1986 where the showers weren't working and members cleaned themselves by plunging into the swimming pool!

Here's hoping the next 30 years are just as good and that we continue to go from strength to strength!

Daniel Black
MNTV Chairman

Eleven go to Spring in Snowdonia – Sunshine, Ice Cream and a Rice Paddy

Starring Daniel, Louise, Tim, Tricia, Hazel, Matt, Lisa, Neil, John, Ally and introducing weekend virgin Peter. Guest starring Simon and Rhydian the Rangers

Our annual weekend in April started with the hope of having the same glorious weather we had had last year so when things did not bode well upon travelling along the motorway through rain.  Nine of us met on Friday night at the Hendre Isaf basecamp outside Betws-y-coed.  Tricia, Tim and Hazel ate their evening meal at a nearby pub and upon their return and Daniel’s later arrival we exchanged stories and then headed to bed.

Act I

Saturday dawned cold with overnight snow on the hilltops but we hadn't come this far to stay at base so we headed out to meet Simon the Ranger on the Craflwyn Estate.  We were also joined by Matt and Lisa who had driven up from Manchester that morning.  Our task for the day was taking out rhody seedlings with mattocks or pickaxes.  We set off up the hill with our tools, stopping part way up to be informed of the red squirrel sighting and how they were trying to keep tabs on them in the wood above Craflywn Hall.  Simon told us it was 20 minutes’ walk to the worksite but 40 minutes and some scrambling and gasps later we reached it.  It was well worth the effort because it gave us terrific 360 degree panoramic views.  Simon showed us how best to take out the saplings and how to dry out the roots by hanging the saplings from the skeletons of former rhody bushes.  This was a bit like decorating a Christmas tree.  Lisa was very pleased with herself as she managed to take out what she called a massive rhody sapling.  Make your decision with this photo…

At lunchtime we got our annual story from Simon which this year was the legend of how the Welsh built Snowdon (by entombing with stones the fierce giant Rhita Gawr after he had been killed by King Arthur).  After lunch Hazel left the worksite to start on the preparations for the evening meal and the rest of us carried on with the task.  The task came to a natural close at about 3pm.  We had managed to clear about 2 acres and we descended the hill by a slightly different route.  Upon arrival back at the car park we decided to start a new tradition of going to the amazing ice cream shop in Beddgelert which has an enormous range of ice cream with flavours ranging from white chocolate to mango sorbet.  On arrival back at basecamp dinner preparations were well under way so whilst some went to have showers and a chill out session others helped in the preparation of dinner which, selected by Daniel who was leading the weekend, was Lentil and vegetable cottage pie with peas and for afters we had Apple crumble and custard/cream.  That evening we swapped stories, attempted questions from the basecamp’s The Survival Game boardgame then we went to bed.

I N T E R V A L

Act II

Sunday dawns cloudy but dry. Today our task would be chopping down willow and birch in a SSSI meadow near the basecamp.  We were up early again today and ready to leave at the appointed time of 9.30 with Rhydian who met us at the basecamp.  We followed him in his little white van and were soon at the day’s worksite.  To get into the site we had to pass through a rather smart garden belonging to a smart house and over a fence.  The worksite was a field next to the house and garden and was very wet and as Neil said would have been very suited to growing rice.  We toiled away with the loppers and bow saws we had collected from Rhydian’s van to cut down all of the willow and birch in the field.  Morning coffee was called and it was to our surprise provided in china mugs by the occupant of the house who use to work in the local National Trust office.  Not only were there china mugs but also homemade lemon drizzle cake!  We carried on working - some chopping, some sawing, some dragging and some burning.  We had to have two fires because the field was quite large.  The first fire was very good and was looked after by Rhydian.  Louise, Neil, Hazel and Ally later found out that that fire had been helped out with some ‘cheating liquid’ whereas their fire had been diligently tended by Hazel.  It wasn’t quite as good as the cheats’ fire but they had had an hour’s extra and cheats liquid.

Lunchtime came and so did the first mishap of the day, a stuck-in-the-mud moment with a boot nearly being lost, but we won’t say who - we’ll leave it up to you to decide.  Clue: it was a man.  There was no story today much to Matt’s disappointment, just the fun of Ally trying out the ‘smile setting’ on her camera phone.  We also ate Tricia’s very tasty St Clement’s Cake (orange and lemon drizzle cake).  Whilst the majority of us ate lunch the smaller fire was looked after by John - Thank You John!  As most of the chopped trees at the end of the field with the cheats fire had been burnt more people were able to work on the smaller fire after lunch.  Ally picked a rather large willow to cut down thinking it would be easy but as usual got it wrong and help came in the form of Peter.  The two of them worked together to get the tree down - Thank You Peter!  We worked away until about 2pm when it was time to down tools and head for home, so we gathered our tools, returned over the fence whence we had come and headed back to the basecamp.  Back at base we swept the floors, divided up the leftover food, cleared away the washing up and said our goodbyes.  Hazel and Daniel were the last ones to head back to Manchester.

Sunglasses, Snowdonia, Sparkling company and delicious food make the perfect weekend.

Spring in Snowdonia 2016 – Done!

Here's to next time MNTV!

Curtain Down

(words and photos by Ally Hardy)

Moving wall stones at Hardcastle Crags on 10 April 2016

We spent a beautiful sunny day today at Hardlabour Crags, sorry Hardcastle Crags, shifting stone. Actually this turned out to be a fun task. Several local volunteers joined us at the work site which was a field just below the moors and above the woodland of the estate. There was a dry stone wall in a field that had been repaired and the leftover stone has been sitting on the field for a couple of years. It was the group's task to dig it out of the grass that had grown around (and over) it and load it onto a trailer.

These stones will be used to repair a different dry stone wall around hay meadows on the estate. The bigger stones, once dug out, were rolled to the side of a track where they were picked up by Drew the ranger using the new grabber arm on his tractor combo. He is hoping we will show photos of this so that other rangers will be jealous. Drew estimated that we shifted about 14 tonnes of stones.

The local wildlife was much in evidence, including pheasants, lots of lapwings sorting out territorial disputes and rabbits that the ranger's dog enjoyed chasing (but not catching). Curlews were heard, but not seen.

Mick

Rhody bash at Lyme Park on Sunday 3rd April 2016

A lovely day and a great turn-out! 18 of us started the day along with Dan the Ranger and Dan the Lyme DofE volunteer.

We moved our cars from the main car park to Knott car park before walking up the steps to the ridge on the left of West Park Drive and walked towards Paddock Cottage.

Once there, we could see the only clump of rhody still waiting to be cut down and burned.

the last clump of rhododendron ponticum

MNTV have worked in this area and along West Park drive for many years, as well as other volunteer groups, cutting down the rhody and burning it, so it was quite amazing to find today that there was so little left.
We 'foolishly' thought that we'd be able to clear it by the end of the day but there was more than we could finish despite having 2 fires on the go!

The reason for wanting to clear the rhody is to return this area to native woodland by planting oak, lime, wild cherry, rowan, hazel, birch with an understory of hawthorn, holly and black thorn once the rhody has been cleared - this is to support the natural regeneration of the woodland. Planting up the woodland should, hopefully, encourage birds such as lesser red polls, garden warblers and tree pipits. Although the rhody will try to grow back, it will be sprayed each year, in the hope of fully killing it off.

lunch break

 Later in the afternoon, Adrian and Sue went into Paddock Cottage with Dan to give it a clean. 

cleaning Paddock Cottage

We had a great workday, even though we didn't quite finish the rhody clearance. Dan was delighted with the cleaning of Paddock Cottage and we were pleased to see, on our walk back to Knott car park via West Drive, that the new planting has already been started on the slopes of West Drive.

Burning brash at Thurstaston Sunday 20th March 2016

I think this was the 10th day without rain - and we had another fantastic MNTV workday, this time on Thurstatston common.
Three of us travelled together from Quarry Bank Mill in Neil's Roomster (so much space!) and 4 others from MNTV met us in the car park at Royston Park. We were joined by Phil the Ranger and Heather from Merseyside volunteers. From there the 9 of us walked, with our equipment, to the area where we were to be working.

When we got there, we continued the wood clearance work that we'd previously started. On that occasion we were cutting down the smaller trees in this particular wooded area near the heathland, but had to finish early because increasingly high winds meant it was unsafe to work in amongst the trees in case they came down. Today we were cutting off the branches from the already felled trees and dragging them to the fire to be burned.

The fire in it's infancy

To protect the ground and manage the size of the fire, it was started on a couple of corrugated metal sheets, which were kept off the ground by a few tree trunks underneath.

Lunch break

As the ground and wood around was so dry, Neil had no trouble getting the fire going. The rest of us, using bowsaws and loppers, cut the branches off the tree's that were stacked in piles nearby, and dragged them towards the fire.

Neil taking a well-earned break and surveying the fire

It was a lovely bright clear day, although we got a bit of a breeze from the heathland. There were lots of families walking on the path nearby, some stopping for a chat. As a particular family were walking by, a very very excited little girl could be heard shouting out "Look, it's a REAL file, a REAL fire" :-)
Many dog owners also passed by, some dogs 'inspecting' our rucksacks to see if they could find any food, but we were wise to this and had zipped them firmly shut!!

Almost time to leave

By the end of the day, we had almost burnt all the brash that was lying around. I believe future workdays will involve us doing similar work on the other side of the path - bring it on!!!

Footpath work and gulley blocking on Burnt Hill (Hayfield) - 13 March 2016

Today was our second workday of the year at Hayfield.  Eight of us met rangers Shane, Myles and Mark at 9:30 in the Sett Valley Trail car park then drove three miles up the A624 where we parked off road and made our way one mile east across the moor to Burnt Hill on the west side of Mill Hill.  The footpath alternated between stretches of flagstones and stretches of peat bog.

The Trust has engaged contractors to pave this footpath all the way to the summit of Mill Hill.  They cannot work between 1 April and the end of July because of nesting birds and the work is very much 'in progress'.  They had used a caterpillar-tracked excavator to cut a 1 metre wide path through the moor and the cut heather sods had been piled to either side.  Helicopters had been used to lift flagstones up to the moor.  Laying the flags is down to brute force using metal bars.

Today's jobs were to 1) in-fill gaps between the flagstones and the moor with offcuts of the sods, and 2) cut up and carry/drag surplus sods to nearby gulleys and bed them in to block the gulley/stabilise the peat.  We used a 'sillage cutter' to cut the sods.

Excavated footpath & flagstones

In-filling
(between spades & flagstones)

The weather was the best of the year so far and the sun shone all day long.  Spring had arrived!  We enjoyed views south to Lantern Pike, Chinley Churn and Mount Famine and to the northeast a snow-dappled Bleaklow.

Panoramic photo of worksite from the east

We saw several walkers during the day, many making their way up Mill Hill then round to Harry Hut and back to where they started, and one group of mountain bikers who Shane in no uncertain terms turned back.  They should not have been riding on the path and had wilfully ignored the 'No Cycling' signs on the stile at the road.

Our thanks to Shane for organising a very enjoyable day.

Daniel

Brash clearance at Speke with Merseyside NTV, Sunday 6th March 2016: The Day of Five Fires

We were off to the wild wild west today to meet up with our friends at Merseyside NTV for a day of brash clearance at Speke Hall. Five of us met at Styal and piled into Neil's aptly named "Roomster" for the journey down the M62, while Christine and Andy met us at Speke.

Lots of brash to feed lots of fires!

After a bit of Scouse v Manc banter with the ranger, Ian, we wound our way through the lovely buildings and grounds of the hall to find some fields with lots of piles of brash. The pattern of the day would be people bundling the brash together, followed by Neil making ample use of his flame-thrower by torching pretty much everything in sight.

Neil brings The Crazy World of Arthur Brown to Speke: Fire Number One

Fire Number Two in its infancy

We got one fire going in the first field, then crossed a lane to find more brash, which required a second fire. Both fires burnt quickly, and we thought our day might be a short one. Lunch was taken with two fires already fed and turned in, so Lisa's cupcakes were heavily indulged in with thoughts of an easy afternoon.

After lunch, Christine and Andy blazed a trail through the long grass (without being devoured by velociraptors) to start work on more piles of brash across the field. Neil was quick to fulfil the need for a third fire, but more work on the other side of the hedge called for a fourth inferno. This is unprecedented on any MNTV workday I have attended, and the scene began to resemble the opening shot from Apocalypse Now.

Fire Number Three

Fire Number Four

With buzzards circling overhead and a soundtrack of woodpeckers (and a fair few Easyjet planes taking off from John Lennon Airport), our groups began to spread across a wide area as more and more brash was discovered behind yet more hedges. Soon, a delighted Neil was setting fire to his fifth blaze, and itching to start a sixth.

John & Jenny load up Fire Number Five

We limited the pyromaniac inclinations to just the five fires, which were all intensely hot. Some great teamwork between the groups kept these well fed, with Merseyside's John and Manchester newbie Jenny using old fencing to carry large brash bundles.

By 3pm we had to reign in our enthusiasm, accept that some brash would have to live for another workday, and let our final fire burn down. The sun had shone, the two groups had got on really well, and all Neil's Christmases had come at once. We got lots done, and hope to be back at Speke again before too long.

Build it and they will come!

Fire Number Five draws a crowd from both ends of the East Lancs Rd

I hear there's a lovely timbered hall round here that would burn well ... we might need to keep an eye on Neil if we come back!