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A fabulous spring day, and in the afternoon a walk out to the Leeds Hospices Woodland to see what work needs doing there.  I met up with Steve Joul.  The woodland is doing fine:  nature isn’t tidy!  But some of the young trees are covered in brambles which could be removed and some branches encroaching onto paths could be removed.

Agreed that at our next event (21 March) we will tidy up the hospice woodland in this way and clear paths of encroaching branches elsewhere in the woods.

What a surprise, after Saturday’s glorious weather, to open the curtains on Sunday morning and find an inch of snow had fallen – and snow continued to fall until there were two inches on the ground.

Needless to say, the woods looked fantastic, and the Crag looked even more sphinx-like than ever!

The Sphinx of Adel Crag: photo by Tom Swire

Another gorgeous, crisp, sunny day and fifteen Friends gathered to collect litter.  We collected about 20 bags of rubbish plus –

three full cans of beer

a car bumper

various car engine parts

a broken tricycle (toddlers)

washing machine hose

a broken china sink

some foreign bank notes (taken to the police)

Particular thanks are due to the person who dumped about four black bin liners of rubbish in Crag Lane.

Another satisfying morning!

Roger writes down one of David’s jokes!

Six of us spent two hours this morning having a look at things we can do in the woods.

It was a beautiful, crisp morning.  Having looked at the bird and bat boxes in Alwoodley Crag Plantation, we made our way to the Crag and the picnic area, and then down the Meanwood Valley Trail, past the pond and the Slabbering Baby, to the Seven Arches, and from there to Copper’s field and then back to the Cricket Pavilion and the Buckstones.

Now that we have been up and running for over six months, it is clear that there are tasks which we can do regularly, tasks which we can plan over a year, and tasks which will require careful planning over a number of years.

A very enjoyable morning.  Thanks are due to David for his amusing badinage which kept us all entertained.

Yes, you are sure of a big surprise!  Alwoodley’s most recent start up enterprise, FOAW Developments, has created a housing estate into which even the most fashionable and discerning sparrows, great tits, blue tits, robins and even bats will wish to move.

Situated along Crag Lane from the Rugby Club to the picnic area, and in the woods to the north, these 25 deceptively spacious, hand made, state of the art dwellings – complete with metal plates to deter squirrels and woodpeckers – are sure to attract metropolitan city dwellers in all their Spring finery.  Each house has a large garden and is only a short flight from the local food stores.  Very handy too for local entertainments like the rugby in winter and cricket in Summer.

Two hours of happy sanding and hammering at the ACA, and the Friends produced 18 bird boxes and 7 bat boxes.

Unfortunately, your reporter seemed to have a mental block and did not manage to hammer in a single nail during the morning, but he did make the tea and coffee and paint numbers on the bottom of the boxes!

Once again heartfelt thanks are due, not only to the enthusiastic volunteers, but also to Steve Joul for his wise and enlightened guidance!

Another fantastic effort by the FOAW gang:  20 bags of rubbish plus a number of items too large for to go in bags (eg a bicycle frame), the footpaths along and through the thickett on King Lane cleared, and rubbish cleared from Nanny Beck most of the way from King Lane down to the Slabbering Baby.

How do these human dynamos find the energy to do so much in two hours?!

Here’s how it looked at the end!

Tom Swire went through the woods and found amazing toadstools which looked like spoof items of confectionary from a bakery.

The toadstool is Fly Agaric (Amanita muscaria) which despite its attractive appearance is poisonous.

Clearing the Reed Sweet Grass

Steve Joul led an intrepid team of volunteers in clearing Reed Sweet Grass from the pond.  Reed Sweet Grass is an introduced species which is extremely vigorous and taking over the pond.  We cleared about a third of the pond – it is important not to remove too much so as to cause minimum disturbance to the small animals in the pond.

While Steve and his team were in the pond, another group of us were clearing vegetation from the Slabbering Baby.

Tom poses by the newly cleaned Slabbering Baby – a water fountain.

Afterwards a binbag or rubbish (cans, bottles and crisp bags) were picked up and disposed of.