The curse of the Himalayan Balsam strikes the Ouse once more. Time for York's hardy GoodGymers to head into the dense vegetation, braving nettles, bugs & trees to help rid the riverbank of this invader. The constant chatter & friendly banter occasionally interrupted by squawks of, "Ooh I've been bitten / nettled" or by the discovery of eye-catching wildlife. Today's spots were tansy beetles, deer, Feargal & a fierce looking unidentified caterpillar. Amy outlined the 'bend & snap' approach & many piles of bashed balsam were produced particularly by Ed, Leanne and Paul as they carved out dens under the willows. Jenna appeared from the river having paddle boarded to the task - against the wind. Good effort everyone.

If there's one thing we know about York GoodGym its that we love a demolition job - last year we had the pleasure of pulling down a shed at Scarcroft Allotments and tonight we went back to deal with the aftermath.

29 large railway sleepers which had formed the old shed base and were now in varying states of decay needed moving a short way so the area could be made ready for woodchip.

6 GG heroes arrived in force - 2 runners, 3 bikers and Vicky with her wheelbarrow combining the task with woodchip collection

Only snag was we were too damn quick and the sleepers were moved and stacked in less than 15 minutes!

...and this despite some big spiders which could have put off the arachnophobes amongst us.

This did mean we had bonus time to peg out the weed membrane with some very bendy pegs

Paul proved that a gentle push worked better than Ed's brute force method of whacking with a rock

Next we were on to digging, barrowing and spreading woodchip onto the cleared space - standard GG fare which we managed in short order with Jane, Paul , Ed, Nick and Vicky taking turns at shovelling and barrowing - with a combo of Vicky's shovel, a broken bucket and the weirdest bent flat spade.

meanwhile Barbara was raking the chips and nattering with the allotment team.

40 mins after arriving, sleepers moved, chips spread and we were away running, biking and barrowing our way home... boom! job done!