A walk to the heronry in Macclesfield Forest, Monday 26 May 2014

Today five of us met at the Leather's Smithy, Langley at 3:30pm and went for a short walk via Ridgegate Reservoir to the herony viewpoint on Trentabank Reservoir.  There we met Sarah Bujac, her newborn daughter Isla and Sarah's mum and dad.  We all spent twenty minutes bird watching and saw several herons, five heron nests and a dozen cormorants nesting in trees on the far bank.  We shared between us the binoculars and monocular that we'd brought.  Presumably the herons in the nests were unfledged chicks whose parents were out hunting.  From time to time there was commotion from the heronry but generally it was very quiet.

Grey heron (but not one we saw!)

During the walk we also saw two mandarin ducks (confirmed by Megan via Google Images on 4G), one grebe, a buzzard, other unidentified ducks and a shoal of small fish.  We walked back to the Leather's Smithy for 5:30pm and had a meal and drinks lasting two hours.  Five of us had the Wild Boar Burger as recommended by Kate, and agreed it was a very good choice!

Thanks to Kate for leading the walk and to Sue for booking the table.

Birch Bash at Formby on 18 May 2014

Nine volunteers turned out to Formby on a warm sunny day.

We shared cars from Styal - three sat navs took 3 different routes :- one did not know the destination, one took a very strange route in Formby, and the other confused its driver on the motorway resulting in a scenic route) - but we traditionally take different routes every time we go to Fomby!

The beach was busy and a high tide was expected and the original (planned) work (fencing the dunes) would have got in the way of the public - so a back up task was found....

before

during / after

We spent the day clearing young birch from a small plantation of pine that had become overgrown.

A black birds nest restricted the area we could work on.  We stopped a little early and returned to the cars via the ice cream van and the beach.

Hedge trimming at Hayfield on 11 May 2014

Another good turnout (especially so because of the wet weather forecast) saw ten of us working with rangers Shane and Mark at Ashes Farm.  Two of the ten were first timers which continues the encouraging trend of the last few weeks.

The job for the day was to trim both sides of a ~150m long hawthorn/blackthorn hedge in such a way that both sides sloped upwards from a wide base to a narrower top.  In that way the sides of the hedge get more sunlight and grow better than if they are vertical.  We piled the cuttings up at either end of the hedge or dropped them into the hedge to compost.  Next week ranger Myles will trim the top of the hedge using the portable power trimmer.

Thankfully the weather was better than forecast and the torrential rain all fell when we were mustering in the car park at the start and at the farm before we walked to the worksite.  The rain that fell as we worked soon blew through and, besides, most of our work was on the upwind side of the hedge which was an effective windbreak/shelter.  Nonetheless we didn't linger long at the coffee and lunch breaks (other than to eat chocolate cake and throw sticks for Rhona (Shane's springer spaniel) to chase) and had finished the work by 3pm (in plenty of time to get home to see Man City become Premier League Champions!).

28th AGM on Tuesday 6th May 2014

We held our AGM tonight in the meeting room at Norcliffe Chapel, Styal.  Ten members attended plus Shane Bates (High Peak ranger).

The AGM covered the usual matters:
Apologies for absence
Approval of minutes of 2013 AGM
Chairman's Report (Daniel Black)
Treasurer's Report (Denise Clark)
Election of committee for 2014/15 (Adrian, Ally, Daniel, Denise, Matt, Sue)
AOB

Daniel covered the following topics in his Chairman's Report: membership, publicity, work hours, work days, work tasks and socials, and finished by thanking all the people who have made the year another successful one for the group.

Ten members earned long service awards during the year:
20 years  Anne Yates
15 years  Sue Bonner
10 years  Daniel Black, Tim O'Donnell
5 years    Matt Smethurst, Mick Sykes, Pip Fisher, Philippa Greaves, Karin Frood

Matt, Tim, Daniel and Sue were present at the meeting to receive their awards in person from Shane.

After refreshments Shane gave us an interesting talk about the work the NT has been doing on Kinder Scout over the last five years to stabilise the peat bogs on the plateau.  Plants are now growing there that have not been recorded for 200 years!

Dunham Massey - 27 April 2014

Eleven of us had an excellent day at Dunham Massey working with head ranger Andrew Wyllie.  Today was the first workday for three of the group and the second workday for three more.

The job for the day was to resurface a ditch opposite the sawmill left in a poor state by the contractor that had laid utility pipes to the new Visitors Centre.  The upper crust of earth had baked hard and if left untreated would not reseed successfully.  At best nettles would grow on it.  We broke up the surface with forks and spades and then raked in about six tonnes of fine topsoil such that the soil resembles the soil in the rest of the deerpark.

Many hands make light work...

When it next rains Andrew will reseed the area and by the end of the summer it should have greened over.  Dunham have taken expert advice about what type of grass to sow.  They don't want a grass that will outcompete the surrounding parkland grass and instead want the parkland grass to encroach over the ditch.

After the next rain the ground will be reseeded

It's been a while since we've worked with Andrew and it was good to catch up with him and hear the latest Dunham news including the great success of the Stamford Military Hospital.

Hare Hill on Sunday 13th April 2014

What a fantastic day - admittedly a bit cold when the wind was blowing, but otherwise dry and sunny for a mixed day of work at Hare Hill with Julia the NT Ranger.

Ten of us (including 3 out with us for the first time) spent the first hour just outside the Hare Hill car park, cutting tree branches that had already been felled or had fallen during the high winds, to a more manageable size. We used loppers for the thinner branches and bow saws to cut the larger ones. These were then dragged or carried to nearer the car park railings and out of the way of the main gate where the NT vehicles gain access to the lake. The ground is quite boggy in places in front of the gate and, without a larger area to drive over, the jeeps could easily get bogged down in the mud.

Once this was complete, we walked down to the lake where we looked at the copse where we would be doing a rhody bash after our morning coffee break. When we got back to work, Gordon got the fire going really easily and it wasn't long before most of the volunteers were busy cutting down the rhododendron ponticum and burning it on the fire. We managed to burn all that was cut down (that was the remit, so no cut rhody was left around, in case the cows ate it the next day) and left the site nice and tidy.

 

There was also a job to do painting the railings around the lake but most people were having so much fun with the rhody that only Adrian and Julia volunteered and went off to do this task.

It was a super day and a good time was had by all:-)

Path repairs and shalom removal in the Northern Woods at Styal

I took the day off (decided I didn't fancy getting tied up in the marathon.....

Thanks to Adrian for leading and providing the photos and text

We worked in the northern woods in the morning mending a path which had been damaged by a sallow tree falling over, we got the timber revetment in and the path will be surfaced properly in the week. In the afternoon we went further into the woods and removed an invasive species called shalom which is low growing and a bit like ivy.