Serious efforts at Wenhaston in the last week before the nesting season stops tree work have resulted in the Wenhaston Environmental Volunteers achieving what we set out to do – when we started onsite in October 2013.
With the exception of some large live specimen trees which we have
decided to leave in place, and a couple of areas where the dead or
moribund trees are so large as to defy hand sawing (but do not block the
path), we have cleared not only a quarter of a mile of trackbed as well
as the station site, but also opened the access between the trackbed
and accommodation crossing 21 northern gateway, ready for
re-instatement.
We have a specimen wildlife refuge close to crossing 21, carefully woven
together in place by Toby and Bob so that it not only won’t get blown
down, but will also provide habitat for birds, mammals, insects, fungi,
and mosses. This will be reproduced in three or four places along the
wooded strip, away from the trackbed and future access footpath.
The Trust would like to thank everyone who has helped us reach this
important point. We hope that all our current volunteers – and some new
ones – will be able to come to Wenhaston on our scheduled workdays in
spring, and enjoy the less frenetic, but just as essential, efforts to
remove stumps, separate branches from fallen trees, mark chainage,
survey, and cut up the logs.
We will now return to where we started, at the west end of the trackbed,
to begin there on producing an attractive, safe and good-looking
pathway for our members – and invited visitors – to appreciate. A trial
section at the west end of the wood, on Wednesday February 26th, saw
about a chain of trackbed cleared of stumps: some of these, though long
dead, defied our best efforts for a good 45 minutes, but ultimately
succumbed.
The spring and early summer will see us clearing and furbishing (is
there such a word?) the entire trackbed, and we hope that funding will
come in (as a result of the Editor’s plea in the Trust newsletter) so
that we can start to rebuild the classic SR post and rail fencing along
this stretch.