Abingdon Green Gym Blog

This week's blog post was written by Abingdon Green Gym Chair, Eleanor D!: Sixteen of us gathered by the bridge over the weir for our session at the town end of the Ock, where it joins the Thames, and we then made our way to base camp on the woodchip path. One of the tasks was to renew the path, and the Town Council had left us a pile of woodchip at each end. The nettles in the area between the woodchip path and the main path were already growing fairly high and threatening to swamp the young trees, so another task was to clear around them. Then, of course, there was litter picking, so some people set off to do that. When the nettles had been cleared, there were plenty of fallen branches to cut up and put on to habitat piles. We discovered some wild garlic and even a fritillary, which we had planted a few years ago before the lockdown. In the Autumn we used to plant bulbs and rhizomes of early Spring flowers such as wild daffodils, wild garlic, wood anemones and fritillaries, which

It was a lovely spring morning for the Abingdon Green Gym volunteers as we started our session up at the Hinksey Heights Golf Course, complete with blue skies and sky-larks singing. It was so clear and light we could see the Dreaming Spires easily from the top of the hill that we were working on. We had a healthy turnout of a baker's dozen, and we started off with a walk around one of the fairways which was being re-opened in order to check what work needed doing for the day. Ably led by our session leader for the morning, Sally, we had a few tasks this session: 1. Collecting up old tree guards and stakes to be re-used elsewhere on the site.  2. Creating some dead hedges to redirect walkers away from the fairway and directly onto the Chiswell Valley footpath.  3. Cutting down some overhanging greenery which was trailing down to head-level for cyclists and walkers.  There were hundreds of tree guards along the side of the fairway, which we collected and wrapped up inside one another

This week's blog post was written by courageous Session Leader, Kevin: We had a dozen or more volunteers that turned out on a cold and frosty but sunny morning at the Riding for the Disabled. This is our third visit to the RDA. The task was the same as the last two trips, which was to clear a long and deep ditch which had been blocked, and which was causing flooding in the pass and making the fields/paddocks unusable. This time we finally finished the job and what water that was in the ditch was flowing nicely on its way - hurrah!  The staff at the RDA are very appreciative of our efforts each time we come, and not only do they give a hand but also supply lovely refreshments of home made cakes, tea, coffee and water! At the same time we get to know more about the RDA which has 16 horses at present which work with disabled adults and children. An addition to there complex is a new indoor area which they hope to organise shows and completions!  The bogged-down ditch James getting stu