Cothill Fen and Christmas Meal, 12th December 2015
For the final session of the calendar year, we were back at Cothill Fen, with our annual Christmas meal held in the nearby pub, the Merry Miller, afterwards. There were a lot of similarities with this Saturday and last - once again we were supervised by Judy Webb from Natural England, reed raking was the main task, and the weather was damp but mild. However, while there were only five of us on the previous occasion, we numbered a dozen this time. Having transported tools and tea kit down the track, as usual, we found the fen soggy and the terrain uneven with all the many tussocks tricky to navigate. The reeds had been cut and required raking across approximately half the site, and stacking in existing piles around the perimeter. While the majority of our workforce were busy raking and pitchforking, Robert and Colin were given the job of cutting back some of the smaller trees and branches on the edge of the fen. In contrast to last week, when our depleted contingent had no...