Branching out - weed all about it

Iffley Glebe plays a vital role in maintaining the rural atmosphere of Iffley village. The glebe is full of wildflowers and the hedge across the field provides birds with nesting places, and insects and berries for food. The glebe is owned by Oxford Preservation Trust and they often ask GoodGym to help with maintenance tasks, particularly keeping the ancient stone wall clear of foliage.

This week we had 2 big tasks - weed the wall and also cut down some sycamore saplings which had sprung up close to the boundary and had been liberally distributing their seeds across a neighbour's garden. Ben and Fred took saws and loppers to tackle the sycamores and everyone else spread out along the inner and outer walls to denude it of weeds. We would usually do wall weeding a bit earlier in the spring, and the clumps of plants were much more extensive doing it in June, but we managed to get the whole front boundary wall cleared and all the problem sycamores felled, filling 3 large sacks with greenery in the process.

After a warm run and task Bethan's suggestion of a dip in the river was very inviting, so we popped along to Rivermead Nature Park for a swim/paddle. Very refreshing!

We'll probably be back to Iffley Glebe again later in the summer for a second go over the wall, plus tackling a section on the northern edge of the site and some hay raking.

Lovely to have a GG tourist in our midst this evening - good to meet you Louise.