January 2011

Early January's mix of frost, rain and grey skies meant not a lot done down at the field apart from some hedgerow conservation.
A patchy overgrown hawthorn hedge to the south boundary has had some of the height removed and made accessable along it's base-line for partial replanting / gapping up.
I use a Stihl long-arm chainsaw from their KombiSystem range. I've been careful to keep long established large dog-rose clusters for re-weaving back at around chest height and into the hedge structure when layering.
Part of the thinning is to enable stock-proof fencing to go in and for the gaps to be filled with new hawthorn plants and periodic placing of Hazel and a few ash. It's a compromise between existing wildlife cover and the long-term life-cycle of the hedge.

At home I've been going over a few plans and paperwork and a bit of an inventory of the nursery stock of native broadleaf and orchard trees I have at home. (Really looking forward to a pleasant few days to get on with a planting scheme, once the perimeter is secure against straying livestock).
Looking further ahead to sunny summer days, I've taken the pre-emptive step of purchasing a second-hand water-bowser for maintaining the orchard trees for the first couple of summers. Collection was via Oxfordshire last weekend, so a fine (but chilly) relaxed afternoon in the grounds at Rousham and then around Christ Church Meadow at Oxford.

Mid-January there was an automated Lower Dee Valley flood warning (phone / email from The Environment Agency - a modest temporary inundation about half-way up the height of the field gate, although the ground never seems to get waterlogged under foot afterwards). The River Dee had been getting higher after both a thaw and rain.
I temporarily migrated south to Salisbury, ironically looking at similar terrain and habitats in river valleys (also with raised water levels).

Along a minor road between Stapleford and Winterbourne Stoke, I spotted a similar small field to my own - here there was an area of grassland, a relatively newly planted small areas of broad-leaf young trees and also a small orchard area. One corner of the grassland had a discretely placed shepherd's living van...

Also in Salisbury, a quick nosey in Scats Country Stores and four 2m lengths of picket fence acquired for a bulk compost bed for dead leaves etc. (Another job for the Stihl Kombi-Tool with a cultivator head to whizz through now and then for a few of cubic metres of humus rich mulch).