The Alwoodley Sphinx in the Snow: 18th March 2018
What a difference a week makes! We had to postpone today’s task from last Sunday due to heavy snow, but today we could not have hoped for a better day.
Two of our party set about picking litter, while the rest of us headed off to clear paths. Note the fine looking hi-vis jackets worn by all our Friends! Their first outing!
Our first stop was a path which leads down from Adel pond towards the bridge over Meanwood Beck. This was badly overgrown with holly but in half an hour we were able to make a big difference.
Whilst there we found four charity bags which were full of….charity bags – hidden deep in the heart of some holly bushes. A year or two ago we found about seven bags of the same charity’s bags in roughly the same area, so we probably missed them. Clearly, whoever put the bags there did not want people to know that he or she had dumped them: rather than dump them in the car park, the miscreant had carried them several hundred yards into the woods and climbed through vicious holly branches to hide them.
From there we headed up the Meanwood Valley Trail to a path on the left which is signposted as a public footpath, but which was almost choked with holly.
We cleared a way through to the bottom of the path and also cleared holly from the Meanwood Valley Trail itself.
Finally, we cleared some of the mud from the trail. The mud is basically the remains of leaf litter and beneath the mud there is in many places a good firm surface of stone. Rob also enjoyed creating a little stream bed to allow water to drain from the trail.
All in all a very satisfying morning’s work.
Today was our first outing with our new Hi-Vis Jackets, purchased with a Members Improvement in the Community and Environment (MICE) grant from Councillor Neil Buckley of Leeds City Council.
Friends of Adel Woods 