Sunday 2nd February 2025 - work party

 It was a bright, crisp morning, hurrah, and despite most people having to leave early due to other commitments, we got a lot done.

Beautiful morning shadows.

As an experiment, we didn't clear the leaves as usual in December but the oak leaves in the glade were still laying thickly, because they take a long time to rot down. As the grass is now trying to grow, the glade was raked and the leaves added to the compost heap.  We left the paths as it would just make them more muddy if they were cleared.

Raking the glade

The snowdrops are flowering and looking lovely, there are a good number now but some were covered by brambles so these were cleared away.

Snowdrop under the brambles

Bramble clearing in progress.

Jeannie lightly pruned some of the fruit trees. It's not an ideal position as it is too shady in the woodland but we do our best.

Clearing vegetation around the snowdrops

Some hazel was coppice and long poles added to the den, other bits were put aside for future use.

Snowdrops all cleared.

Sunshine at the top of the woodland.

Hazel catkins 

A lot of dead wood was also collected and added to the log piles .

Sunday 19th January 2025 - FWG extra

 A few group members met with Edward Tollemache to plant trees to extend the pasture with trees on the Helmingham Hall parkland. Supervised by Glenn and Jeannie, we planted just over 50 trees, mostly oak but also a few sweet chestnut. All grown from seed collected locally by the Framsden tree wardens, hence the first stage of  prising the trees out of the seedbed. 

The deer came to see what we were doing but moved away once they found out there was no food.

The holes were pre-dug so we were shown how to plant the tree and then place hessian mats to suppress the weeds.

Digging out the saplings from the growing medium, good root systems!

Planting the tree, hessian mats and tree guards added after.

Extra protection is needed because of the deer. Each tree has a cactus guard which is held in place by 2 stakes and then attached to the stakes with staples otherwise the deer use their antlers to lift them off!

We got a really efficient system of putting the stakes and guards together and then pushing the stakes in with the telehandler.

Finished!

About 3 hours and 50 trees later on a rough terrain felt like a good morning's workout!

Sunday 5th January 2025 -

 Happy New Year! It was a very wet morning but we we needed to get the bench tops done and it a couldn't be postponed so the elite team met to remove the old rotten bench tops, last picture, and do a few other jobs

Snowdrops are starting to show their flowers and we cleared a bit of undergrowth so we can see them properly.

  

Some trees have come down in recent high winds, this one was resting on another one so it was cut up to bring it down safely.

Honeysuckle leaves - it will be spring although not just yet!

The finished benches

Mid Build

Before

Jeannie planted the hedge plants from last time in between work parties

Sunday 1st December- Work Party

The old bridge, blending in nicely!

It was a bit of a grey day and quite a few of the group were either ill or otherwise engaged. Nevertheless, we had the challenge of replacing the bridge at the top which had got a bit bouncy as it some of the timbers were showing signs of rot. 

First off though, a bit of raking the leaves in the village hall garden, sorry no pictures.

The old bridge was constructed in March 2014. It was before the blog started so I'm just going to share a few photos from then. It was put in to increase accessibility to the woodland and we got a grant to cover the cost of the materials. A few of us are still in the woodland group although not everyone was able to be here this time. 

The date on the photos is wrong as they were published on Facebook on March 7th 2014

Just starting

Work underway.

Finished bridge (2014)

Fast forward to December 2024

The old bridge had to be levered up and then flipped over to get it out of the way to break up. 

The soil was dug out to fit in the new timbers which are the other way round to the original ones, and slightly different lengths!

Once in place the gaps were filled with soil, the planks screwed to the bearers and the wire netting replaced to make a non slip surface. 

Finished bridge 2024!

You may be able to tell that the weather had deteriorated by this time so we put the benches and hedge planting on hold for next time.

Thursday 31st October 2024 - Halloween event

Halloween 2024

This year we invited Helmingham primary school to carve some pumpkins for our trail. They had a great time last week with a whole school pumpkin carving session and tonight we benefitted from their efforts. Here they are before and after dark.

We managed a little bit of setting up in the afternoon then put the lights on once it got dark. 

 

After dark, more pumpkins arrived.

The firepit eventually got hot enough to toast the marshmallows.

Thank-you everyone who came and who helped.