Young visitors to the orchard

I visited the Turnditch Orchard this evening to start some preparatory work for the road side gate installation. My car was loaded with the necessary tools, but alas they did not get used. As I arrived I noticed six young sheep in the orchard eating grass. They'd invaded from the adjoining field. The skills I'd learned in my childhood on the local farms in the Buckinghamshire countryside came in to play. I was able to herd the sheep off the orchard back into their field without them panicking too much. 

They'd found two routes into the orchard. Their main route was through a rickety old wire fence which previously been protected by my electric fence, but alas no longer since the theft of the fence energiser box. The second route was via the field gate belonging to the neighbouring farm. That gate is an iron gate with just four horizontal bars rather than seven bars. It is fine to retain cattle, horses or adult sheep, but the gaps are too large to enclose exploring lambs. After a quick inspection of the extent of the problems I drove to my home to pick up my fencing equipment. Fortunately I have a spare roll of one metre high wire stock fence and some spare two metre treated wooden fence posts.

I was working until dusk to repair 20 metres of fence and install new fencing. I was able to re-use a lot of the old fence posts in place, but I ended up having to drive six new posts into the ground. Once the fence was secure I set to work on the troublesome gate. As a temporary fix I wired four metres of wire stock fence along the gate. I'd previously mentioned to my neighbouring farmer I was considering making his gate secure and he'd been happy for me to do so.

It is the farmer's responsibility to make sure his stock do not wander and cause damage, but I have to be pragmatic and take proactive action to protect the young fruit trees from marauding sheep.  I'll revisit the gate during the week and install a barrier which is more friendly to the dogs of people using the footpath. 

It would be interesting to know who has responsibility for the boundary hedge/fence and the their field gate. The farmer is a tenant of the Chatsworth Estate who actually own the land which adjoins our orchard site. I organised and funded the relaying and restoration of the blackthorn hedge. It had been neglected by previous parties. At some point part of the historic original hedge has been torn down, possibly during works to lay the sewer/water pipes or during river bridge repair work. Whichever it was, it has left us with a rickety wire fence which proved to provide no barrier to the sheep.

Building a temporary stile in the Orchard

In a couple of days time volunteers arrive on the orchard to start the process of culling trees on the embankment at the edge of our orchard field. I agreed to this work about a week ago, but in the intervening period I had to quickly erect some wire stock fencing across the width of the orchard to ensure the neighbouring sheep don't invade our land and damage the fruit trees. Unfortunately the new stock fence bars the way to the trees on the embankment and the volunteers would be faced with constantly having to climb over the stock fence, most likely damaging it in the process.

Today I spent a few hours building a stile over the stock fence to allow people to climb over safely and without damaging the wire fence. I utilised four round fence posts each about six foot (1,95 metres) tall to form the two sides of a ladder over the wire fence. I cut some robust half round 3 inch wooden fence railing into 60 cm (2 ft) sections to form ladder rungs. It is crudely constructed, using a chain saw, a spanner (wrench) and a hammer with coach bolts and fencing wire holding it all together. However it is a robust construction and should do the job. It weighs around 100 kg (220 lbs), carrying the wood and the tools to the far end of the orchard burnt off loads of calories.

Let's hope people find it useful!

Why are things never simple in the orchard?

Finally on Thursday we were able to pour concrete to form a beam to support the new gate post and fence posts on the top of the river bank at the Turnditch orchard. The beam is about two metres long and approximately sixty cm square in profile. It took roughly 2/3 of a cubic metre, about 1.5 tonnes, of ST4 grade concrete with added polyester fibre to reduce cracking to complete the beam.  The actual pour process only took about 30 minutes from the time the mixer lorry arrived. We now have to leave the beam for a couple of weeks to harden somewhat before setting up the posts. 

Concrete beam supporting gate post

In the picture you can see the fence post cast  in place. It looks a bit tilted, but that is just caused by the camera angle. According to the  builder's level it is well squared and vertical. At the base of the post you can make out a couple of layers of plastic bubble wrap. This was added to increase the diameter of the post socket hole in the concrete. We'll lift the post, remove the bubble wrap, and then reinstall the post with dry sand packing. This will allow subsequent removal of the post for maintenance without damage to the concrete beam. 

You can also see a dummy post embedded in the concrete. This also has bubble wrap and acts as a form for the socket hole in the concrete for the gate post. When we are ready to install a gate post we'll pull out the dummy post leaving a clean hole for the new post. 

There is a matrix of steel reinforcing bars hidden and embedded in the concrete to strengthen the beam. The steel is carefully designed to resist the potential stresses from the posts. During the next few days we'll cover up the concrete beam with aggregate/soil from the original hole so people will be unaware of the minor civil engineering buried beneath. As mentioned in an earlier post this work will help to prevent river bank collapse so close to the road bridge. 
It was a lot of work, when all we were expecting was to drive a post in for a short fence on the river side bank.

River Bank Fencing

We've started installing fence posts along the river bank at the Turnditch Orchard. We'll be setting up a wire stock-fence using those posts. This is all part of the plan to make the orchard site safer for local children and dogs. Normally the river is quite shallow with a gentle flow, but after a storm or in winter when the river is in spate it is an entirely different beast. It would be a dangerous place to enter under those conditions. 

We've been clearing the river bank of uncontrolled shrubs and trees so that we can plant some willow spiling to help reinforce the banks against erosion. We've also removed some elm trees which appear to be infected with Dutch Elm Disease. All of this work has significantly exposed access to the river, so we need a fence to improve safety and prevent visitors and users of the public footpath from accidentally straying into the river Ecclesbourne. We also need to stop dogs entering the river from the footpath and going upstream under the road bridge to fields where sheep are grazing.

We were able to drive most of the fence posts into the ground. A 20 Kg post driving tool helped to ease the task, though the repeated lifting and dropping of the tool onto the posts was quite hard work. The following day we certainly discovered muscles we'd forgotten. However as we approached the roadside near the bridge it became progressively more difficult to drive the fence posts into the ground. We started hitting rock buried in the ground. So we have one fence post as yet not installed. We'll need to use a pickaxe to dig a hole and then use concrete to securely embed the fence post.

After the work I was talking to one of the local residents. I was very interested to discover that some years ago part of the river bank next to the bridge had collapsed into the river and had to be rebuilt by the roads authority. It certainly explains why we found so many rocks in the ground at that location.

Edit: in a later Blog posting you can see this single remaining fence post generated a lot of extra work.

Fence is broken

As I drove past the orchard site yesterday I noticed the top wire of the new fence at the roadside was slack. I stopped to inspect it. At the lower end someone or something had pulled back a couple of metres of wire. When I followed the length of the fence, about 100 metres, I found a break in the wire. It looks like a stress break so I'm not sure what caused it. The fence after all is only one year old. Such are the trials of land ownership.

I effected a quick temporary repair and pulled the wire back into place by hand. It will need some proper tensioning and a permanent repair. The fence has a 15 year guarantee, but it seems a bit mean to call the fencer out just for a single wire break. 

As it happens I had been driving back from Lester Lowes with a pair of 8 foot  by 6 inch fence posts. I'd purchased them to form the end posts for the electric fence which I'm planning on the other side of the field. I needed to have a method of tensioning and fixing the high tensile conductor wires for the fence at each end. Last night I've decided to invest in a Gripple Torq wrench and some Gripple fixings. I can use the tool for the fence repair, the electric fence installation and also for future fence repairs. I'll no doubt do some damage to fences when I start coppicing trees on the embankment. and river bank.

Edit 21st Oct 2014

The Gripple tool arrived today. After checking a training video on YouTube I went to the orchard to fix the fence using Gripple fixings. I repaired and retensioned the fence in less than five minutes. It gave a neat strong repair.

The hungry horde

We called by the orchard site on Boxing Day to find about 15 sheep from the adjoining field. We gently herded them back, but had no equipment with us to fix the fence problem. They'd found new gaps. further along the field from our last repair. The sheep are clearly very hungry having destroyed many wild tree saplings and ring barked some other hedge trees too. The branches and logs we'd left from the last trimming work have been completely stripped. Most of the ewes have babies on-board, so we can't be aggressive with them. The soil is getting quite damaged from their hooves, but the sheep have removed a lot of the brush we were intending cut anyway saving us some work.

The field "mown" by the sheep.

We'll pay another visit this week to patch the holes in the fencing. I'm quite pleased we haven't planted the orchard trees or we'd be looking at having to replace some expensive fruit tree. We're suffering from the neglect of the land by previous owners.

We discovered a small stone lined entrance of a tunnel/culvert (about one metre in diameter) running under the road bridge embankment. We think it is the route of a small stream which shows on some of the older maps but the stream bed across our land has been mostly filled in at some point in the past 150 years. From the style of stone work I'd guess it was built at the same time as the railway bridge. In the autumn this tunnel entrance was hidden from view by a large rose bush and blackthorn. We can see an old iron grate a couple of metres into the tunnel presumably installed to stop animals straying up.

Residue of stream bed running across orchard site

Edit 29/12/13: We had a chat with the farmer about the sheep. The four legged demolition machines are just being stubborn. There is plenty of food and mineral supplements for them at the other end of their field. They just love ash tree bark! We also called to let them know are hedging contractor is going to start work today on renovating/relaying the hedge between our fields. They were pleased to learn that we are not ripping out the old hedge and replacing it with fencing.

Sheep expelled

We are now ready to plant the fruit trees, but they need protecting from sheep incursion. Today we effected a repair to the hedge where the sheep had created a trail via a hole in the hedge from the adjacent field. This morning there were none of the woolly beasts to be found in the orchard site, they're probably grazing elsewhere. Yesterday there were several sheep in our field.  We don't mind their presence particularly, but we need to keep them out when the fruit trees are planted,

The hedge is in a poor state, both overgrown and also a lot of dead wood after years of neglect. Blackthorn really is nasty stuff to battle through when fixing stock fence in place! What appeared to be a small gap took four metres of wire stock fencing and some fence posts but the gap is now fixed. This will be a temporary repair until the hedge is relaid during the winter.

We'll be creating stock fence wire enclosures for each tree that we plant. These enclosures will provide protection for the fruit tree saplings if any sheep manage to find another route into the field. Next to consider is protecting the trees from rabbits! Maybe some plastic sleeving is required. We've delivered a heap of fence posts to the site ready for the tree enclosures.

We'd noticed a 5 metre elm tree which had been snapped by last week's winds. It was in an awkward position overhanging the River Ecclesbourne. To simply cut it down would have caused it to fall into the river. In the end we attached a long rope and, from a position of safety, winched the broken top half of the tree down and away from the river. The dead tree top is now pile of logs on our wood heap and I now have greater confidence in my rusty skills of creating eye splices in ropes.

A large ash branch had fallen in the winds and was projecting over the roadside pavement. It was hung up in other branches and too heavy to pull down safely. We chain-sawed it into sections in situ and removed the individual pieces. For ash wood, it was surprisingly heavy. 

After the work we called in to the local butcher Anthony Andrews to buy some meat for our Christmas Open day. It is really pleasing to find such a good butcher's shop in the locality. We've not been disappointed so far.

We've appointed a fencing contractor to install a roadside stock fence. Over the next couple of years we'll rejuvenate the old hedge with the intention of having it relaid and subsequent removal of the wire stock fence.


ps: The following day. Despite the efforts to protect the trees from sheep/rabbits we ignored the far greater risk. Wolf damage!  We've temporarily stored the trees in our back garden. This morning we discovered our German Shepherd 6 month old puppy had chewed off the top of one of the apple saplings. Grrr!

Fixing the hedges

Now the leaves have dropped at the the autumn (fall) frosts we are able to the see the extent of the neglect of the hedges by the previous owner(s). It is outside of our abilities to quickly repair the fences so we've asked a couple of fencing contractors to quote for installing a stock wire fence next to the roadside hedge. It will provide some security and also prevent animals straying.

We've accepted a quote from Adrian Rochford to have the field side hedge (between and the adjoining fields) restored and layed in a traditional Derbyshire/Stafford style. Work should start in a couple of weeks.

We've also taken delivery of the first trees for the orchard. We'll be planting them soon, but first we'll need to patch a couple of gaps in the fence. Currently sheep are straying into the area and would no doubt do some damage to the young trees.

Last week's storm did some damage and snapped some of the dead trees. I'll be visiting with the chainsaw to tidy the mess. Some of it will have to be winched from the place it overhangs the River Ecclesbourne. More timber for the firewood pile.

We've placed a small notice on the gate post providing brief details of the project and a link to this site.

Planning the Ashbourne Road orchard plot fence

We've reviewed the roadside hedge on the Orchard project. 

The approach road to the railway bridge creates an embankment leading from the River Ecclesbourne to the crest of the road bridge. 

To improve the natural environment, we're going to coppice the trees growing on the south side of the embankment. The tree canopy blocks out the light and reduces the variety of species growing on the south facing embankment. The existing trees appear not to have been managed for many years. Some of the taller trees overhang the road and railway. When we fell the trees to create the coppice stools we'll have to proceed carefully. We'll use wire cables and winches to ensure the tree fall where we want them to go.  We'll probably have to take out most of the trees progressively along the embankment working from the river end toward the railway. This is necessary to create the safe felling space for the larger trees. Within a couple of years though there will be substantial regrowth from the coppice stools, but in the meantime other natural species will have the opportunity to recolonise the embankment.

The roadside hedge needs a lot more attention before we'll have it fully restored. There are gaps from deadwood and also from damage caused by a road accident. We need to make the hedge stock proof, so we are planning to install a 90cm high galvanised wire stock fence along the roadside boundary extending from the river gate to the end of the rail bridge parapet. We measured this and discovered we'll need to install 108 metres of wire stock fencing. The need for the fence is improve public safety and to reduce the chance of livestock escaping on to the road. There is a fence lower down at the foot of the embankment slope, but we'll need, temporarily, to dismantle the fence during the coppicing process.

Once the fence is secure, we'll gradually work on restoring the hedge using traditional layering and replanting at the top of the embankment slope as necessary. Our estimate is it will take about three years before it starts looking like a reasonable countryside style hedge. We'll plant a variety of hedgerow saplings in increase disease resistance and also to provide better variety. Once the hedge is properly re-established we'll remove the wire fencing.

New owners on site

We officially visited the site for the first time yesterday as the new owners and changed the locks on the gates. The gates are iron farm gates and not mounted. There are two gates to the plot, on the road gate the sandstone hinge post is broken and needs repair. The inner gate is totally missing the hinge post so we'll need to install a new post fairly soon. It gave us a chance to try out the 4-wheel drive on the old Freelander we bought last month as we drove off-road for the first time.

Fortunately we'd come armed with bolt cutters, a couple of new padlocks and a few metres of new chain. We were able to improvise temporary locking arrangements and cut away some of the old chains. A local farmer has a right of access to his field through our entrance, so over the next few days we'll visit his farm and give him a set of keys.  

I walked around the field and found some evidence of dumped rubble, so there may some work necessary to deal with the unwelcome present from the previous owners. Up on the road side hedge there's evidence of a car accident which has caused some damage to the hedge and also left the front wheel and axle of a car on the embankment. We're thinking of installing a low wire chainlink fence at the roadside to provide some security while we work on rebuilding the hedge.

The first task is to cut down the grass and thistles, this awaits the delivery from Estate Machinery of a brand new Kawasaki Brush Cutter tomorrow, then we can start work. We did slash down a few weeds and shrubs to open up the path, but didn't make a lot of progress, but we felt when deserved some refreshment at the local pub the Railway Inn just down the road. It was well worth the visit.

Some of the blackthorn and wild plum saplings in the meadow area will be cut down carefully so we can save the wood as shanks for walking sticks to be sold on Ebay to hobby carvers some time next year. They seem to sell for about £3 each so this create a small income, particularly if we also harvest the ash and hawthorn in the wooded area.