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.

Started the hedging

We spent a couple of hours in the Turnditch Orchard this morning in the bright Autumn sunshine. We were working on cutting some of the hedges. These we the ones we'd had re-laid and renovated early last year. They've grown quite tall and need trimming back to encourage dense growth within the hedge.

We've been using an extended pole hedge trimmer powered from a 2.5KW petrol generator at the end of a long power extension lead. The generator starts easily using a recoil cord if you remember to turn on the control switch.

Sam hard at work with the hedge trimmer.

Stump pulling competition

We had a great competition at the orchard field in Turnditch last night using a cable winch to pull up the stumps of the Blackthorn bushes. It was all going well until the occupants of a previously undiscovered wasp nest decided to intervene. Everyone received at least one sting from the insects who did not like us disturbing their wood pile. Then poor light stopped play.

The volunteer team scored a narrow 5 - 4 victory over the management in terms of stump extractions.

Clearing thornbush

Now the summer bird nesting season has finsihed we've been able to get down to clearing a sizeable patch of black thorn bushes at the end of the orchard. During previous years of neglect by previous owners these bushes have been allowed to grow on a level part of the field.  Their thorns make them a nasty almost dangerous type of undergrowth to remove. We've using a chainsaw to topple them leaving stumps some 30 cm high. 

Over the next few weeks we'll use cable winches to pull up the stumps and their root network. I was able to find a convenient source of steel chain. We use the chain to wrap around and grip the stumps as we winch them out. The chain  supplied in retail hardware stores is either too weak or grossly overpriced. Even our local agricultural supplier Lester Lowe  didn't have a suitable chain on its capacious shelves.

We've been left with a huge pile of bushes to burn. We started the burning this week, but the as the wood is green it will take a while to get the job done.

Our volunteer has learned a healthy respect for the thorns and I suspect he is very grateful for the thorn proof gloves we provided him at the commencement of his voluntary work period.

Thankfully after several weeks my foot is recovering from injury, so soon I'll be able to get back to a full schedule of work in the orchard.

Fruits of our Labour

I and the volunteer were working on the Turnditch orchard last night preparing the ground to remove some more blackthorn bushes which have invaded the field. With my wonky foot progress was a little bit slow but steady. We are working to make the land safe so other people can be invited on to the land.

I was able to take home a couple of the Queen Cox apples which we allowed to fruit this year. They have a gorgeous flavour. It gives promise of great fruit in the future.

Neighbours to the rescue

The young man who volunteers came to the rescue over the long grass on the orchard. He successfully took on the task of mowing the the grass and weeds. It takes about five hours to complete this task and is hard work. While I'm recovering from my foot injury it's not a job I should attempt. The dumped rubble prevents the use of a normal mowing machine.

It orchard is now looking as though it is tended and cared for thanks to his work with the field trimmer.

Off my feet

The grass is long in the orchard. A couple of weeks ago when I was cleaning out the stream bed I managed to tear the muscles under my right foot. It makes walking quite painful. The doctor called it Plantar Fasciitis and said it will take several weeks to resolve, but I shouldn't need surgery!

So no hard manual work for a while.

Meanwhile we were able to sample the first few plums and cherries from the orchard. They were delicious.