Pure pleasure planting

Duncan in the foreground, desolate moorland behind (needs more trees that).

It was agreed that this was the most pleasant morning's work in a while. We planted just over 200 trees in a small field just off the A62 way out west of Marsden. It didn't rain. And our convivial hosts provided us with tea and soup afterwards. Pure pleasure, and something of a relief after several rainy and stressful weeks. We were helped by a pair of Scouts, and Rose from Longwood Scouts - and I will stay in touch and hope to involve them in more work. Tree Society regulars were, myself, Ann, Philip, Neil, Julia, Ben, Andrew, Cath, Duncan and Dave. And we also had help from our hosts Tracy and family and dogs. Cake was carrot.

And I need to nip back there sometime and finish planting another 25 or so trees, as I had miscounted stakes/guards/trees.

Lindley Infants Owls rule!

Tilly looking a bit wet, and lots of Lindley Owls and mums and dads in the background.

We were joined today by Lindley Infants Owls, led by Mrs Shires. They bravely turned out on a not very nice Saturday morning, and helped us plant almost 500 trees. Again we were at Scammonden, planting, Oak, Ash, Hazel and some Rowan. We were also visited by Colne Valley MP Jason McCartney, who lent a hand, made a cash contribution, and gave us some suggestions of local Companies we could approach for more support. Tree Society folk attending were, Guy, Philip, Dave, Ben, Neil, Geoff, Andrew, Ann and Tilly. Tilly helped me hand out badges and leaflets to the children. Ann handed out home made oat biscuits to all. Considering the drizzly damp weather we had a good productive morning. I just hope everyone got home, got dry, and warmed up afterwards. I recovered by having three pints of Linfit Bitter in the Sair, so I wasn't very effective for the rest of the day, quite relaxed though.

Scammonden and Golcar Scouts

Golcar Scouts planting an Ash tree

Back to Scammonden today and we planted over 300 more Ash. We were assisted by a brilliant turnout of 19 Golcar Scouts, who were excellent workers! Weather was mixed, but the sun shone some of the time. Cake was a splendid coconut crunch. Regular tree society folk included myself, Philip, Neil, Geoff, Dave, Brian, Roger, Trevor, Ann, and new recruit Andrew (well we hope he is a new recruit, we tried not to scare him off).

We who also work on Thursdays

Trevor and Brian finishing off an ailing Birch

I was recruited by the Senior section this morning, and went round to various sites with Brian, Trevor and Peter to "beat-up" (which means plant extra trees) and to cut down a couple of dead Birches.