Jarn Mound Wild Garden - Saturday, 30 December 2023

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Blog by Kevin.  Photos by Kevin and Sally

For our last session of 2023, Abingdon Green Gym was at Jarn Mound Wild Garden, which is one of the Boars Hill sites managed by the Oxford Preservation Trust.  It was attended by 15 Green Gym volunteers and 2 OPT volunteers, Peter and Mary. 


The tasks for the morning as requested by Hannah of OPT was to clear the pathways through the Jarn Mound Wild garden and fill in the watery muddy patches around the gate entrances and at the bottom of the steps leading up to the Mound, with cut branches and a topping of brash from a pile of previously cleared bracken and brambles.


We did a quick walk around the area with the volunteers to show everyone what was needed. The conditions, as you can imagine after the recent storms, were very muddy in places, but one consolation with working in the garden was a large shelter (a facility we seldom have!) which was ideal for our refreshment break.


The volunteers strung out along the path to spots where brambles and trees had started to grow over the pathways to start cut these back and to clear fallen branches following Storm Gerrit.  A selection of suitable sized branches were taken to the gate entrances.  Once they had been cut to the right length they were then laid on top of the muddiest areas and covered with a topping of bracken from an old pile.  The remainder of the cut material was used to form habitat piles in the wood, which hopefully will be a vital refuge for invertebrates.

 

The weather held and, with encouragement from passing dog walkers, it made the morning's work very enjoyable. The benefit of the shelter with some seating meant that the refreshment break lasted a little longer than normal but being between Christmas and New Year there was a need to savour the time outdoors in these days of limited daylight.

 

Kevin


Getting started

Mary, one of the OPT volunteers, bagging cut vegetation

Break time!

Catching up at break time

We need a bigger shelter!

Kevin checking in on Mary

Lots of these fungi about

Margaret and Rosie cut back encroaching vegetation

James and Ursula remove encroaching vegetation from the path



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