St Mary's Ecology Group visits the wood

I hosted a visit from St Mary's Ecology Group (from Rye) to the wood today. I'd been to talk to them a while ago about Peak Oil and related issues, and had mentioned the woodland, and they've been waiting to visit ever since!
We took a couple of hours to walk around the wood, visiting the wayleave, the footpath, the pond and various other spots. It was striking to see the difference between the growth in the areas we've coppiced and the other parts of the wood:
There were lots of butterflies, but I just photographed one, as it was the first time I've had a chance to inside our wood - a silver Washed Fritillary:
I'm told they the group enjoyed the visit, and I certainly enjoyed walking round the wood without doing jobs for a change - though I do enjoy the work as well!

Mike

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Logs! Lots of logs!

It's been a busy couple of days for me in the wood. Tracy's still teaching this week, so I've been on my own, hauling logs around.

but there's definitely signs of progress:

You'll notice I've stacked logs at the end of the rows in alternate directions - this stops them spilling out sideways.

The really hard work has been fixing the track up though, but it's coming on nicely:

I've also put in a footpath sign at the junction, as since we moved the pile of logs from the end of our ride, we've had numerous lost walkers coming through the wood.


There's still a lot more to do - we need to be able to drive all the way to where we were felling last winter before the end of August!

Mike

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A new improved firewood shelter (part 4)

A brilliant day to be in the woods! Lovely sunshine, but not too hot. Best of all, we've finished the roof on the firewood drying shelter! Andrew dropped in, so we made sure he got his hands dirty, cleaving some chestnut for the roof:
He got the hang of it nicely, but then again he has been practising with a froe making kindling already.
He also gave us a hand moving some logs after I'd cut them up, though some went into the trailer for delivery to a friend in return for a favour they'd done us.
I think the shelter looks pretty good now with its roof complete - all we need to do now is add a gutter for rainwater harvesting!
You might notice an extra support to the left - we thought the cross-bean was sagging a little, so we trimmed down a Y-shaped pole we'd saved nearly three years ago, thinking it would come in useful some time...
The shelter's also a handy place to suspend some birch bark to dry for fire lighting.
You can see the earlier construction of the firewood shelter in part 1, part 2 and part 3.

Mike

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Cool thunder clounds in Camber

We had a great thunderstorm this week. Not great because of the lightning, but because of the impressive clouds that rolled over:
I took a short video to show how fast and low they were, and then had to duck inside as the rain came down!

Mike

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A new improved firewood shelter (part 3)

OK, I know this is taking us for ever, but work has been very busy for the past couple of months! You can see the start of the firewood shelter in part 1 and part 2.

The latest job was to make some walls for it. The walls of a firewood shelter need to keep rain out, but let wind in, so that the wood in there can season. I sharpened some stakes:
then we drove them in along the edges and fitted sticks in between them:
This should let some air blow through while keeping out the rain. We're just doing two walls for now, the third wall (on the near end) will be put in once the store is mostly full - after that we'll get wood in and out through the opening on the left.

Our friend Paul and his daughter Emily came up to help, and Emily drove the land rover through the wood with a pile of logs in the back:
I cut up a few logs in a rack:
and everyone gave a hand loading them into the shelter:
We might build the walls right up to the top later, and we still need to do some more on the roof.

Elsewhere in the wood, it's turning into a bit of a jungle!
and Tracy got some nice pictures of spider webs:
And what were Pete and Tom doing while we were working hard in the wood? They decided that the cage wasn't good enough any more, and that the sofa was the best place for a nap:
Also, Tom (the one with the white face) has learned to turn on our portable radio - a few times now we've gone out and left it on the table, only to find it turned on when we get back! We've caught him in the act since, so we know it's him rather than Pete.

Mike

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