The X tractor

On a Saturday morning that felt very autumnal, 13 GoodGymers arrived from all across London to help out with today’s task. We were back at Fulham Palace in the moat to continue the job we had started a couple of months ago - this was our third time tackling the moat and the transformation was really beginning to take shape!

We met with Fulham Palace Trust’s head gardener, Lucy on the moat bridge and she gave the team a brief history of the moat. The moat was restored a decade ago, to represent part of the Palace’s original medieval moat which was nearly 1.4km in length and the largest domestic moat in Medieval England! The moat is host to a really diverse and important wildflower area (one of the most diverse in north London!) and botanists recently discovered many rare insects and plant species, such as bascum nigrum and varieties of wild mint growing within it.

Lucy asked the team to remove EVERYTHING from the overgrown sides of the moat, this included the weeds, thorns, leaves and the never ending bindweed! She also asked for the the remaining grass to be trimmed right back in what Sarah brilliantly described as "a number 1 haircut" - an excellent description!

Speaking of Sarah, today’s task was her 150th good deed! 🥳🙌 150 times she has shown up to do good and get fit for her community, amazing work, Sarah!

So back to the task...Lucy had driven up the bright red tractor to the side of the moat and onboard had an abundance of tools to help us do the job. There were rakes, telescopic shears, and lots of industrial sized waste bags for all the moats weeds and trimmings. After scaling the fence with the help of the trusty collapsable stool we then used the step ladder to descende into the moat - all safety and risk assessed...we did it last month and all legs and limbs remained intact! 😬

In and on top of the moat, the GoodGym army set to work weeding, chopping, trimming and raking. Biscuits, Sarah, Andrew and Diane focused their efforts on ensuring the part of the moat we had cleared on our previous visits was passing the 'number 1 haircut' test. All that was needed now was a rake-up artist! With some strong raking and no-nonsense shear cutting, the grass and weeds began to look a lot thinner and tidier. Biscuits took across the step ladder to help them with their reach, or was it to secretly trap everyone inside until they provided biscuits and treats?! 🤔🍪.

Katie, Lucy and Frankie did a fantastic job on tackling on the weeds and overgrown weeds at the top of the moat...some chop notch work from them all in removing lots of dead weeds and spruces. They definitely won today's competition of 'find the longest bindweed' and they celebrated by holding their prized find aloft.

Back in the moat, Jo, Ben, Jess, Amy, Bethan and Beth were tackling the moat sides nearest to the moat bridge. Ben did his best mountain goat impression 🐐 as he scaled the sides and balanced superbly as he cut down the large weeds and thistles. Not to be outdone by Ben's impression, Bethan took it one step further as she managed a special run and rake action. Jess, Amy, Beth and Jo certainly weren't raking it up as they went along as they efficiently raked all the leaves and grass into big piles at the foot of the moat and quickly filled up the industrial sized bags.

After an hour and a half of hard work and with 9 industrial sized bags filled with weeds, leaves, thistles and grass we called it a day. The final couple of bags were dragged along and out of the moat by Sarah, Bethan and Beth, thank goodness they had bags of muscles! The moat looked amazing - check out the before and after photos!

We had a lovely team photo around the tractor that was now filled with the industrial bags full of weeds and leaves ready for the compost heap. Lucy and Katie couldn't resist getting in some calendar snaps as they posed on top of the tractor! Vogue watchout!

Before everyone either set-off home or on to the next of our Saturday Community Mission double-header we of course had to have some delicious baked goods to celebrate Sarah’s 150th good deed AND Lucy’s 150th good deed day (Lucy was technically on 149, but as today was a double-task day her 150th deed was imminent - big well done, Lucy!)

It was so lovely to see everyone and thanks again for all your hard work!

Shoutouts 📣

Big welcome to Frankie who completed her first good deed, and to Diane from GoodGym Lambeth and Jo from GoodGym Wandsworth - hope to see you at an H&F task again soon!