A long and winding wall?

New kid on the block, Pepper!

Interesting start to this weeks session at Sherborne as the first task was to unload the new boat from the long trailer. This mighty vessel has been recently bought to sail the Broadwater and of course to enable more effective removal of weeds from the water. Having unloaded the boat we made our way, with long trailer, to the Lodge where 40+ straw bales were waiting to be removed from the premises, now the exhibition of Mike's photos has finished. We then transported the bales to the nearby tenant farm where they came from and neatly stacked them in one of the barns. The farm is one of the smaller ones in Sherborne's estate but it certainly sets excellent standards in balancing its use of the land for wildlife & plants with the arable and livestock farming.

Not the Osprey I hoped to spot, but one of the pair of egrets

Lunchtime was spent entertaining the new springer puppy which has Maddie's colouring and then searching the Broadwater for the Osprey Mike had spotted flying in this area earlier in the day. I wasn't so lucky but it was still good to see the pair of little egrets, our resident swan family, heron, coots and mallards.

The afternoon was spent brush cutting along the estate drystone wall by the A40 and East Belt. This was a continuation of the work from last week and we must be well over the 1000 yard mark now and there is still a fair amount to go. At least my skill levels are improving in this area although the mixture of  'old mans beard', low lying tree branches and brambles were quite challenging in the hot September temperatures!

Link to the NT blog on the Chedworth Archaeological work I joined a couple of weeks ago, this was day 12 showing much more than I was able to see at the time! If you have the inclination there are several blogs covering each stage of the 'dig', just follow 'the previous' link.

More bad news on the environment, this time on SSSI's