Doing Their Bit for Snakemoor

Robyn Thorogood, Volunteer Manager of the Snakemoor Nature Reserve, writes ...

A sunny morning greeted us on Saturday 19th October and we had a great volunteer work group with 14 turn up to help maintain and improve Snakemoor. It was a very productive morning.

A significant task was cutting and removing the increasingly large branches growing above the Willow tunnel. So big branches of the large Willow growing over the tunnel were cut away with a chain saw and a lot of Ash and Sycamore saplings in danger of crowding out other trees were removed.

Karen Pawsey took many of the Ash away for use elsewhere.

A lot of growth behind the larger Sweet Chestnut just off the East side of meadow was removed in a start to get this tree growing more vertically.

A effective litter pick produced a bucket full of rubbish including a lot of bottles — it's a shame this work is required at all in such a lovely natural spot.

The stump seats at the waterfall were cleared of nettles.

One of the small Sweet Chestnuts on the westside path had a side branch spliced to replace the broken lead vertical stem.

Orange Hawkweed plants from my garden were planted in South-East corner of the meadow.

Finally, a sign for the closed path was reinstated.

The volunteers were:

Julian & Lorna Watson, Gerry & Sue Michell, Michael Phillips, Andrew and Mary Hearsey, Ros Hawarth, Linda Fisher, Sarah and Glyn Curtis and Chris & Robyn Thorogood.

Julian is kindly planning to take over my Snakemoor management role from next May and until then we will work together. Lorna, Sarah and Glyn were welcomed to their first work group — we would love to see many more of the new village residents coming to join us too: please keep an eye on this website for notifications of future Snakemoor work parties.

Robyn Thorogood
Volunteer Manager of Snakemoor