the stuff of
nightmares!!
The exhausted NCV looked behind him where he saw armies of trees, marching across the landscape, all clamouring to be removed from their tight fitting garments. A glance ahead showed him that escape was hopeless. The path out of the woodland was blocked by a mountain of plastic cylinders. What could he do? Where could he hide? Who could .....
WAKE UP!!!! IT'S ONLY A DREAM!!
Yes - the sweet dreams of the NCVs may be haunted this week after a second day of tree tube removal at the Dacre Banks Nature Reserve. Trouble was - the tubes were not normal tubes. They were .....
SPIRALS!!!!!
Yes - those horrible things that break into pieces once they start to perish.
Let's see how they got on with what promised to be a less than easy task....
The NCVs spread themselves through the first
section of woodland, systematically hunting
down trees that were spiralled.
Keeping downwind, Paul crept up quietly on an
unsuspecting spiral. He knew that if it
got a sniff of him it would go into 'Gripfast'
mode in an attempt to thwart removal.
Brenda emerged from the willows proudly
clutching some hard won tubing.
Throughout the woodland hundreds of spirals were removed in record time.
Actually - the job wasn't quite as bad as we'd expected.
Many of the spirals behaved themselves and
were quite easily unwrapped from their trees.
Phil decided to to try and fit as many spirals
as he could into this dumpy bag. By applying
a little weight he found that they could be flattened.
Landowner Michael used his tractor to help transport spirals
up to his top gate.
By coffeetime the majority of the
site had been de-spiralised.
After this it was a case of finishing off the
remaining spirals and
then collecting up the heaps of tree
tubes removed last week.
That's it Julia - whatever you can comfortably carry.
This trio of smilers had braved the edges of the 'Bog of Eternal Stench' (remember that
from last week?) to collect these remaining tubes.
Just how many tubes can you
squeeze into a dumpy bag?
Once they are in the bags you then had
to carry them through the plantation.
HEAVE!!!
By lunchtime the job was done and everyone could
eat, secure in the knowledge that an early get away
was on the cards.
The reserve's dining table was beautifully laid.
However, none of this made Ken happy.
He was clearly disgruntled with the fact
that he could find no bread at home for his sandwiches
this morning and had to make do with his wife's rice
cakes and some salady bits.
Never mind Ken - at least it was a healthy option!
After lunch the tarpaulin of spiral shards was emptied into a bag for easy transportation.
Brenda and Phil then showed off
their origami skills ....
....by fashioning the tarpaulin into a delicate swan.
Days
from a bygone age number 14 - NCV revealed
Remember
last week's challenge? Did you guess the youngster who was showing off that little chick? It was, of course, our very own volunteeer co-ordinator, Liz.
Then...
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