Sun was shining today when we left for Rais, and came and went throughout the day, but boy was it cold. Numb fingers and toes by 4pm, but another 3 piles of Rhodie brash to show for it and a helluva lot of root balls axed out by the boys.After removing all the storage heaters from our new house, we had a whole load of fire bricks which were taken down into camp today - in the recently re-welded wheelbarrow.... they will be ideal to make the base for the clay oven in the coming months. Looking forward to Rais pizza nights and roast spuds on a Sunday.
The hazel windbreak seems so far to be surviving but it's difficult to tell with only a week having passed. The new buds are still green and firm but it remains to be seen as to whether it will survive. Tracey and her new replacement flask appeared shortly after we arrived, but sadly Flee is nursing a bad back and so the male team this week was made up of Ant and Simon battling it out at the biggest-Rhodie-root-in-one contest.Tracey and I began again on the Eastern side, cutting back the Rhodie down to stumps while Ant took an axe to the remaining roots on the West side and Simon made good progress on the banks of the stream. A few of the root-balls are being re-homed this week to form a windbreak in someone else's garden; so after the torturing they receive at our hands, at least not all of them will end up being chipped or burnt to death, (more's the pity).
At some point in the past a Scots Pine had come down and landed on top of a massive Rhodie across the stream making it a complete bitch to workaround, particularly as the whole tangled mess was full of bramble too, but after a mighty soup lunch we managed to clear it and at least see what we were dealing with, Going to take a fair amount of work to shift the logs off the roots to get them out but Simon reckons doable - which is good as the alternative killer chemical option I'd rather keep as a last resort.
Something is overwintering in the badger sett too - but sadly not a badger. I will reset the camera trap one lunchtime this week to see what it is, but I suspect rabbits. The pheasants are still roosting in the Yardarm and making a dusty mess of the kitchen workspace, but at least they are warm and dry which was more than could be said of us lot - the sun was warm, but the general temperature just a little too cold still for sitting around too long. Or maybe that's just an age thing?
