Xtreme gardening - site 303

On a damp day, last Tuesday, Mike, Davy and I, assisted by 2 rangers with a chainsaw and a hedge-cutter, trimmed the edges of the Priory CES rides and coppiced a few of the larger hawthorns. We tried to burn the arisings but no way were we able to get a fire going. Rain stopped play at lunchtime, leaving some of the outer areas untouched. Next year, we'll tackle the area between nets 3&4 and the public path around the old Fingers Lake.

Today I went back for a couple of hours. The weather was a complete contrast to last week's, with glorious sunshine and just a few fluffy, white clouds. I managed to rake the grass rides, removing most of those bits of 'thorn, rose and bramble that nets tend to pick up, especially when your back is turned! A couple of us still have to go back shortly and burn all those arisings - if we can.

For entertainment, I put up a 40' in the old feeder ride (or Bluefinch alley) and was rewarded with 3+(3) Great Tits, the newbies all 6's.

In order below: netride 2&1, netride 3&4, new bullfinch alley, extra net site at the bottom of the site, old bullfinch alley / extra net site. All post butchering - they'll look alot better by the time we start the CES monitoring (says he).


I'll take some more pics in the summer, when everything will have turned green.