Dear stalker...

Guy and I went on a site visit to Wholestone Moor, to develop a planting plan for the 1000 trees that are to be put there. While on site we saw a hare (lovely) and a deer (not so lovely, as there was plenty of evidence of it having been eating trees). Guy hopes to reconcile his Buddhist beliefs, vegetarianism, and squeamishness, with his desire to cull these tree-eating cervine scum.

Beating up Marsden Golf Course

Not an act of violence, "beating up" in our language means adding extra trees to an already planted site. This hillside overlooking the golf course was planted by us 8 or 9 years ago, and some of the trees have either been swamped by grass, or eaten by invading sheep. The man from the Forestry Commission inspected the site back in the Summer and said it needed improving. So today we planted another 250 trees, Sessile Oak and Italian Alder, in deer tubes. We were: myself, Geoff, Philip, Steve, Stephen, Andrew, Peter T, Remy, Duncan (and Harvey the dog), Ben, Cath, Vashti and Hap. Cake was a classic fruit cake, and the sun shone all morning. T-shirt weather, well, t-shirt and gloves. Group photo by Geoff.

The new tubes standing out against the old. Photo by Duncan

Wilberlee School

Not one of our own sessions, but we did lend the School some tools, and Duncan (and Harvey the dog) was there to represent us. Duncan helped plant, and gave them some useful feedback on the state of last years planting.

Butterley bliss

From the left: Geoff, Vashti, Philip, Jess, Ben, Dianne, Remy.

A far nicer, dryer morning spent at Butterly planting another 250 trees courtesy of the Woodland Trust and the One Community fund. We were: Hap, Remy, Geoff, Peter, Dianne, Steve, Jess, Philip, Helen, Vashti, Duncan (and Harvey the Dog), Ben, and myself. We had ginger cake at break time. Sometime after Christmas we will return to plant some TCV Big Tree Plant trees on this site.