Kymm and I arrived at Waterman's Park in the May sunshine ready to get stuck in helping local volunteers to maintain the green space.

We were joined by Gus and Luis and were briefed on today's tasks; give the dragon path that the volunteers have created in the middle of the park another trim to keep the shape, or weeding and pulling up lots of long grass threatening to steal all the light from the plants.

In the warm sunshine and with the ground dry from lack of rain it was thirsty work. The volunteers were happy to have our help and assured us several plants would now survive with more access to sunlight, and hopefully a long drink.

We needed cold drinks after an hour in the sunshine, before Gus headed over to Hanwell Hootie and the rest of us headed home for a lie down!

GoodGym's first visit to Blackberry Corner since October showed a huge transformation. Through spring, things had sprung. Mostly weeds around the fruit trees. HANGOT's Orchard Love day for May looked to clear space around the trees so that they could feed off all of the precious sunlight and water that hit the orchard.

HANGOTers scythed the paths first, with everyone staying out of the way of the swishing blades. Once they'd passed, GoodGymers got rolling with their shears, quickly chopping 2 metre wide circles around the tree trunks. Nettles, grass, cleavers and hemlock were wiped out with each snip. The animal lovers in the group found lots of ladybirds, spiders and snails, which they moved to safety before removing the weeds that they'd been sitting on. Rakers followed the choppers, moving the cuttings into large piles to dry out.

After the trees were given some breathing room, the team moved onto cutting back a large overgrown area at the far side of the orchard and also digging out burdock and hemlock, which needed regular and sustained removal to eventually kill them.

The tasks were completed quickly thanks to a lot of volunteers and a desire to get off to today's Hanwell Hootie music festival. A couple of the ladybirds had the same idea. Rather than searching for a new home in the orchard, they decided to hitchhike on a bag to go on a journey of musical discovery via a coffee stop.