Routine work at Hackfall Wood: 01-08-2017

Summer's marching on. July has ended and the first of August saw 11 NCVs make their regular monthly visit to Hackfall to undertake various landscape and access maintenance tasks around the beautiful gorge woodland. Unfortunately the weather was so very wet that work was abandoned at lunchtime. In spite of this they achieved a good deal during the morning. The pictures below give you an idea of what they got up to.....

 Fallen tree across the path?

No problem - Alastair, James, Tom and Sally will soon sort you out!

Logs were stashed and brash was piled 

for the invertebrates (and other creatures) to inhabit.

There we are - that's better!

 According to Tony, who worked with Jan to repair 2 dog gates.....

"The vertical posts were splayed which allowed the sliding gate to escape from it’s runners. With intelligence borne of desperation we redesigned the first gate by cutting off one third and re-attaching it to the now horizontal remaining piece using the bent and rusty nails. It was a masterpiece of the cabinet makers art. Any dogs trying to squiggle under have to be rat sized, larger dogs trying to get over run the risk of strangulation."

The result: The gates slide up and down 

to accommodate dogs who wait to be let in, 

just as the designer intended. 

A team of six set off to do battle with some bracken 

and any Himalayan balsam they happened to come across-
which of course they did!!

They found this rather splendid fungus. 

So - here's the competition question for August - can you identify the species?
If you know then feel free to post up your answer in the comments box below.

And finally....

This week there's a little treat for you all. It turns out that the NCVs have a talented song writer (and singer) in their midst. Apparently The Harrogate Songwriters Group set a challenge of writing a song about the environment, so Tom decided to have a go at a format that would be simple enough for even Donald Trump to understand!! It certainly gets across a very clear message. Have a listen and enjoy via the link below. (If you are asked to log in then just click on the 'no thanks' option. You may need to download the file to your computer then open it up.)

Earth, sea and sky by Tom Richardson

Ros E.