No ill wind

By ‘C’:

A scarf for work on the scarp would have been good today.  It was a bit draughty on the crest of the Chilterns.

– Those specks in the background: not a flaw in the photograph (or on your screen), but Red Kites using the up-draught to gain height for zero input of effort.

Our own effort this morning was being put into – surprise, surprise – more coppicing.  

Of spiky stuff mostly (hawthorn and blackthorn), intruding from the fence line on to what is meant to be open chalk grassland.  Come summer, the area we cleared should be a riot of colour with wildflowers, butterflies, etc.  And did you know (we only learned this today, from one of the information-boards on site) that the Chiltern Hills were created by an aftershock from the event which formed the Himalayas?

Meantime, the first action required of Green-Gymmers was to mind the sheep, while the site warden turned the landrover into the neighbouring field to deliver essential equipment (tools and tea-crate):

That is what warms a session-leader’s heart: to see volunteers automatically stepping forward to help out, without having to be asked.  Would I expect anything less of experienced WGG folk?  No!

For a moment or two afterwards, it looked as if the sheep were following the Green-Gym men …

but no, they were headed towards the Natural England landie, probably in the expectation that its appearance meant extra treats for them:

Some of the flock hung around for quite a while:

With cows, one might well conjecture that such behaviour arose out of curiosity: that they were interested in what we were doing.  With sheep – very sweet, but “dumber than a handsaw”, as they say in Wisconsin – one could reasonably assume they were simply checking there really were no goodies they were missing out on.  Notice a few of them still lingering in the background here, as a Green-Gymmer sets to, moving the first batch of timber he has cut:

Good ol’ Mr W seemed mischievous at times this morning.  When it came to laying out for tea-break, the waiting staff (alias ‘C’) found the breeze was blowing away granules of instant coffee between heaping on to spoon and loading into a mug!  Similarly, one of the volunteers found he had to adjust aim, to allow for wind direction and speed, when using the sweetener-dispenser. 

OTOH, the wind did an excellent job dispersing the soundwaves from the site-warden’s chainsaw.  This meant we could work alongside, with our muscle- and character-building hand-implements, without being disturbed by the racket of a power-tool: 

(Note no helmet today: just safety goggles.)  That there was a power-tool in operation, also meant that one volunteer who knew he would be arriving later for the session, did not need to phone the group’s mobile to get directions: he found us just by following the sound of the chainsaw.

Coppicing rarely feels like hard work at the time, but some very conveniently placed trees – which are meant to be alongside the fence-line – made for a welcome rest at half-time:

By then, the weather had also greatly improved.  From the improvised ‘tea-rooms’ there was quite a clear view:

And indeed there was not a spot of rain all session.  The first drops began to fall a few minutes after we were back in our respective cars headed for home.