Abingdon Green Gym Blog

Blog by Sally.  Photos by Ursula and Sally Once again, we were blessed by dry weather on Saturday for our session at Kennington Memorial Field, which is owned and managed by Oxford Preservation Trust.  This is an old grassland festooned with ant hills and is traditionally grazed by cattle in the spring and autumn.   We assembled in the car park by the playing field and made our way through the gate to the Field as Adrian, our leader for the session, led us to a suitable spot to make our camp near a large bramble thicket which we had been asked to remove using scythes, loppers, saws and the tree popper for small blackthorn trees.  It was great to welcome back the newlyweds, Helen and Henry, who have had a very busy year, and Olivia, who has been away doing a course and had returned for a week. Three scythers started cutting back the wild rambling thicket of bramble, blackthorn and rose, which made for brutal scything, whilst the other 11 Green Gymmers attacked the scrub in a different p

 Blog by Eleanor, photos by Michele and Eleanor                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                 It was the time of year to cut down and rake our wildflower patch in Southern Town Park. There were only ten of us this time and our usual meeting place, the youth football club car park in Lambrick Way was jam packed with cars as there were a number of matches going on. Fortunately, some of us had come by bike. Bikes and tools along the fence We made our way down to the site at the far end beyond the playing pitches. The ground was very soft, so we decided to pull up as many nettles as possible as well as rosebay

Blog by Sally, photos by Margaret and Sally On a glorious sunny morning, 8 Green Gymmers gathered in the Cothill School car park to meet Stephanie Cole from Natural England for our session at Cothill Fen, a site of Special Scientific Interest and home to the variety of rare alkaline-tolerant plants and the invertebrates they attract.  Green Gym have been coming to this site for well over a decade and it has been wonderful to see the transformation during this time to restore it.  We were last here in August.  Adrian was our leader this week and both he and Steph had been working at Cothill Fen the day before at the regular monthly session with the NE volunteers.  Once we had gathered up the tools, we made our way along String Lane to the gate to the new board walk, where we would make our camp at its wider point.   Our tasks for the day were to continue fixing chicken wire along the board walk to help prevent slips, especially when the boards are wet or icy, and to rake up the cut mate