Volunteering the Day After the World Cup Match
TODAY - VOLUNTEERING THE DAY AFTER THE WORLD CUP MATCH
Following the very successful and enjoyable visit of the Lord Mayor last Monday, (to formally open the wild flower meadow), the focus today moved away from the wild flower meadow, back to the horticultural wellbeing of the rest of the park. We all had to work really hard this morning because in 10 days time we have a visit from the RHS judges as part of the Britain in Bloom Competition.
We did have an extra treat this morning at our coffee break, because after last week's visit we had some cake left over. Never to waste an opportunity, Picture 1, shows Gill with her cousin from Canada, making sure that it was cut up into enough pieces so that weall had a share today. Thank you Gill. It tasted even better today!
We were impacted by a number of missing volunteers staying up through the early hours of this morning to watch England's World Cup match against Mexico but nevertheless we still had a very respectable attendance of 51 volunteers today. Our volunteers today included 6 volunteers from NatWest, 8 volunteers from Brentwood High School and Community College, Sigad and Sheeba from Bridge College, Caroline and partner who started the major project of repainting the Poppy Bridge, and Elspeth who we were pleased to welcome back after a long absence.
We also had an excellent visit from Kieron McGlasson from Sow The City today. Kieron came for a discussion with Tom and myself about some interesting potential woodland projects for us for the future.
TODAY - WATERING TODAY + CAN YOU SPARE A COUPLE OF HOURS TO HELP THIS WEEK
Given that we have not had much rain recently, and the weather has been very warm, many of the newly planted flowers in the park have started to wilt. Lorna arrived early, and soon had the long hose pipe out on the wild flower meadow providing much needed sustenance to the newly planted summer bedding plants around the outside of meadow. Great work Lorna!
On the other side of the park Carl connected the other long hose pipe and gave the Flower Walk a good soaking before handing over the hose pipe to the students from Brentwood High School and Community College working at the roundabout. Picture 2 shows one of the students enjoying the experience of giving the begonias in the roundabout flower bed a much needed supply of water.
Picture 3 shows Carl, watering the moss garden, under Ilma's expert eye. I must admit the moss garden perked up a lot after a good soaking! Thank you both.
Given the impending RHS judges visit and the weather forecast for hot, dry weather in the days to come we were discussing at our coffee break today the possibility of setting up a watering schedule in the evenings this week.
Can you please let me know asap if you could spare an hour or two any evening this week, and approximately what time, and I will set up a schedule? Between Allan and myself, we will make sure that the hose pipes and water bowsers are available. Please help if you can - otherwise the flower beds may look pretty dried up and awful when the judges arrive.
TODAY - FLOWER WALK
Picture 4 shows 7 members of the large team working on weeding the Flower Walk this morning. In the picture are Lorna, Steve, Lucy, Anne G, Julie, Jude and one of the NatWest team. In addition Christine, Jane. John, Anne W, Elspeth, and 3 other NatWest volunteers.
This huge team of volunteers made a phenomenal impact and removed many wheelbarrow loads of ground elder, sticky willie and bindweed. A truly excellent improvement - Thank you all.
TODAY - BIRD GARDEN
During the last few weeks, whilst the new flower bed wall was being rebuilt behind the Bird Garden, we have tended to stay out of the way of the brickies working there. I am afraid that as a consequence the hedge around the Bird Garden had virtually just "taken off" back to an overgrown wild state. So today was the day we decided to tackle this.
Picture 5 shows Steve with 3 volunteers from NatWest having made a phenomenal improvement on the hedge around the entrance gate. Elsewhere further along the hedge, Allan led the way with the large power hedge trimmer. This task was so huge that by the end of the morning it was not quite complete. There was some great work here - thank you all.
TODAY - TREE BASES
Picture 6 shows Taylan and Shasvat standing by one of the 3 amelanchier trees next to the cafe. Taylan and Shasvat were two thirds of a 3 man team including Patrick, who checked all the trees on the main field and made sure that all the tree bases were cleared of any weeds and then mulched with woodchip. This was a great job. Thank you guys. Thank you also to Steve who mowed around the trees and along the path edges of the route to be taken by the RHS judges.
Later on this morning Tom was experimenting with repairs to the old sit-on mower and managed to mow around the bases of the rowan trees before then mowing the lawned areas of the wild flower meadow. Great work Tom - thank you.
TODAY - TREE VANDALISM
For the second week running we have experienced night time vandalism involving attacks on trees with low hanging branches.
Picture 7 shows this week’s example. Further to the picture being taken, overnight last night, the vandals managed to break this huge branch off completely. Thanks to Tom today, he was able to very quickly saw up this fallen branch and the park was made safe and clear again.
Picture 8 shows Tom throwing some of the smaller branches into the skip. Thank you Tom.
TODAY - ELSEWHERE IN THE PARK
We had three teams doing an extensive litter pick in the park today. There was Winnie and dad Andrew, Emilene and dad Ben and Shigad and Sheeba. Unusually there was a lot of litter collected this morning but that may heve been caused by the fact that MCC had not emptied the bins from the weekend and the animals had been scavenging.
Murray did some temporary stabilising repair work on the vandalised circular bench whilst Geoff has time to investigate a longer term repair design. Thank you guys.
Picture 9 shows Louise standing by the triangular bed which she had been working on. Thank you Louise.
Thank you to Sonia for caring for the flower beds near Buddy and Lucy.
TODAY - APPLES IN THE BIRD GARDEN
I am delighted to report that the tree pruning training course which Joyce went on last year is literally bearing fruit. After Joyce pruned the fruit trees in the Bird Garden, a number of them are now starting to grow apples. Picture 10 shows the evidence!
Well done Joyce!
TODAY - ALERT!
Very unusually, when we packed away all the tools today there were two wheelbarrows missing. Allan, Shashvat, Patrick and I searched the park but could see no sign of them. If you think you might know what has happened to one or both of them can you please let me know asap!
Thank you once again for your amazing support.