Thrupp Lake, 19th June 2021

By Andrew -

This session was held just a couple of days before Midsummer Day, but the weather was far from summery. It was a gloomy start at Thrupp Lake at Radley - a new site for us and another location managed by the Earth Trust.

We parked up in the lane beside the lake and waited for warden Tim (and apprentice, Beth) to arrive and unlock the gates to our assembly point beside the now-demolished 'Sandles' building. Tim gave his opening speech to the fifteen or so Green Gymmers gathered and outlined the tasks to be getting on with. There were a few to choose from. These included repairing a section of path that was prone to flooding, replacing a section of damaged perimeter fence, pulling of Himalayan Balsam and the lopping back of stray branches from the main path.

We divided up and got stuck in. The fence repair team were led by Beth and set off with some new fence posts - with new holes to be dug before setting them in place.

Tim was in charge of the path repair and instructed us to install a wooden board beside the water's edge, held in place with some small stakes, nailed together. Once the board was up, rubble was gathered from the pile by the car park and wheelbarrowed down to fill in the puddles.

Meanwhile, the balsam-pullers were unable to locate the patch of reported balsam by the old bird hide and returned empty handed! The lopper team was more successful and completed a circumnavigation of the lake.

By the end of the morning, the puddled section of path was looking much improved and a trio of fence posts had been sunk. A successful session!

-Andrew


Thrupp Lake.

The Lake itself.

The assembly.

Footpath in need of repair.

Barbara and the rubble pile.

Tim and Carolyn rake as Rosie supervises.

The fence repair team - Dan, Sally, Kevin, Graham and Beth.

Packing up.
Andrew with wheelbarrow (photo by Sally).

Barbara and Dieuwke on wheelbarrow duty (photo by Sally).

The fence repairers again (photo by Sally).

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