Cawston Greenway

Right then, where to start!! This is the first time that we have set ourselves a goal on the greenway and happily we achieved it.

Basically at the point where we finished on the last workday, to the point that is where the greenway crosses the Coventry Road (the end) is 0.20 miles. I decided that if we clear 0.04 miles of path on each of the next five workdays, then we will get to the end before the end of the month. 0.04 of a mile sounds like no distance at all but convert it into meters and suddenly it is 65 scrubby, hawthorny, blackthorny, brambly meters and it isn’t quite the easy ride that it looks, in my mind’s-eye.

We are working round larger trees. Look how the higher trees on the edge have forced this tree to grow at an angle.

But we made it and managed to release a lovely Ash clearing whilst we were at it. We didn’t chop and trees down but did a lot of lopping of branches on the inside edge of the path.

65 meters of cleared path. If you look at the last blog you will see the photo of this before we cut it back.

There are loads of Ash trees and also some really good specimen trees, as we push on down, and I really think that we need to clear the scrub around them and kind of release these trees to allow them to thrive. At the moment they are just being crowded out by the higher trees on the edges overhanging the path.

Ash clearing that previously we would of cut down. We are now a bit more imaginative...

Mike continued with his hedge-laying and Matt found out why we are flooding up by The Bear. Plenty to do and time is ticking by. I wonder if we can do another 65 meters tomorrow?

Good turn out today with nine of us making it. Thanks to all who mucked in. I am really impressed with where we are at.

Until tomorrow!

Paul

Busy afternoon on the greenway with six or so of us making it and we did a bit more hedge-laying in the bird-box clearing (the one with the bench and bird-boxes that young Paul put up last year). Mike was pretty much doing the hedge-laying and it’s starting to look pretty good now.

The rest of us got on with clearing the path downwards from this clearing, which was a slight deviation from the plan, due to Mike having concerns that we maybe had cut back a bit too savagely on the last workday. This is where the path is quite narrow so we made it very open with views across each side.

It is good to see that in the areas that we have widened previously, there are loads of shoots coming up. Don’t have a clue what the shoots are but I guess we will find out soon enough.

The next workday is next Sunday and I think we need to press on downwards from where we left off today. I would also like to put the rest of the bird-boxes up in the clearing. We also have a lot of insect houses that need to go up, so plenty to do. As soon as we get to the end, we can then push back the scrub in selected areas and see what starts to grow. In the bit that we cleared today, the ground was totally dead underneath the scrub.

Thanks to all who made it today. We got lucky with the weather, just 🙂

Until next time!

Paul

Great workday yesterday and good to see that about six or seven of us made it. We started pushing back the path northbound from where we last left off and discovered a group of struggling young Hawthorn trees, that were fighting with the scrub around them, and the higher trees on the edges that were overhanging and tangling with the Hawthorn growth.

Hawthorn clearing.

We cleared the path either side of these trees and it will be nice to see them develop. They will have white flowers in the late spring that are pollinated by midges, and later in the year bear numerous haws. The haw is a small, oval dark red fruit about 1 cm long, berry-like, but structurally a pome containing a single seed. Haws are important for wildlife in winter, particularly thrushes and waxwings; these birds eat the haws and disperse the seeds in their droppings.

Haw fruit on our Hawthorn trees.

We started to make a dead-hedge on one side of the clearing and this will be a fantastic habitat for lots of wildlife as it becomes established. The clearing is at a section where the path changes from being in cutting to being pretty flat, before becoming high on embankment. This gives us an opportunity to lay hedges of the edges and allow people to enjoy the views across open countryside on each side.

Good progress was made and the naturally open and flat section that we worked on, felt different again to the sections worked on previously that have been in cutting, and can sometimes feel a bit claustrophobic. Especially before we started to widen the path.

As we push on it will be interesting to see what else we discover and I think we all need to be as creative and open-minded as possible. This workday was a mish-mash of ideas thrown into the melting pot on the hoof. The outcome was truly fantastic and we have created yet another varied piece to our rich and diverse greenway.

I have put a couple more workdays on the list at https://cawstongreenway.wordpress.com/workday-dates/

Lastly, thanks to Fin and Aaron for bringing marshmallows. We roasted them over the fire at the end of the day and they were yummy.

Until the next one!

Paul

Today started with a bit of head scratching and an exploratory dig at each end of an aqueduct that takes a spur of the Lawford Brook under the greenway. Whilst we uncovered each end, we were still unable to get the brook flowing through. The flooding problem still remains so we either need to somehow clear the aqueduct, or accept the fact that the water is now a feature of the greenway and use it to our advantage.

Firstly we started to clear the higher ground that runs alongside the water and as this gets trodden down it will become established as a new path.

Andy then had the brilliant idea of trying to funnel the standing water into a narrow stream. There is a slight current and sure enough, when we narrowed the path of the water, the current increased and we made a good flowing stream.

Our new stream flowing quite nicely.

This will be good for walkers because they will have dry ground to walk on and, it makes a fantastic feature for the greenway because it allows insects and other wildlife that need water to thrive and colonise. There are still areas of standing water that refused to drain into the new stream but these are host to boggy plant life so I guess they are OK to stay.

Same point looking north.

All in all a good workday with ten or so of us turning out. I think we made the best of what we had today and it will be interesting to see how this area of the greenway develops. There is a lot of tree cutting that needs to happen on the south facing bank that runs from The Bear pub all the way to the new underpass at the top of the Cawston Grange Drive. This is going to be tough and hard work but the rewards will be well worth it. However, we need to concentrate on the bits that we are currently working on before pushing on with this section.

There is a fantastic circular walk that Gary, one of our volunteers, has mapped out. It goes into Long Lawford and then through quite a few of the local villages, before returning along the Cawston Bridleway with the option of dropping down into the picnic clearing and coming back along the greenway, or reversing the walk by starting on the greenway. Either way it is well worth checking it out at:

http://tothehills.wordpress.com/2011/11/24/20110814_long-lawford-to-cawston-via-church-lawford-walk/

Well that’s about it for now. Next workday is Wednesday 30th November and back to the path clearing where we left off last time. We are almost onto embankment so this will get a lot easier. I will put some more workday dates in the workday bit on the new tab on the brown bar later today.

Thanks to all who made it today, we are making good progress.

Until next time!

Paul

Good midweeker today and we carried on with the path widening. It’s tough ripping out the scrub but it has to be done. What is left is a lovely wide path that will allow all users enough room to comfortably use the greenway. It will also allow walkers and cyclists to stick to dry ground as the rain creates puddles on the original path.

We cleared the path from the fire downwards. The last bit in the foreground is just about to be ripped out by me.

Hopefully grass will establish itself on the newly cleared areas. However, we have to bear in mind that we have not removed the bramble roots, so we need to do this at some point, or we will just be fighting a losing battle.

Looking north at the point where we are at with the path widening. It's daunting but we are making good progress.

We are about to break out onto the top of the embankment and the clearing gets a lot easier. I think it might be wise to carry on to the new underpass. When we get to this point then we need to go back to the second picnic clearing and push downwards towards Potford’s Dam. This is going to be tough because it is in cutting and also it is a long walk to get there.

The good news is that we are creating a lovely safe walk or cycleway to Draycote Water Park. I am going to investigate the flooding at the section that goes under the A45 and maybe just rip out all the trees so that a new path can be formed around the standing water. Eventually Sustrans will sort this bit out properly but due to the current spending cuts, this could be a long way off.

Next workday is at the flooded area near to The Bear. I am looking forward to seeing if we can fix this, or end up having to go around it!

Paul