Wapley Bushes Local Nature Reserve, near Yate and Chipping Sodbury, South Gloucestershire.


The Nature Reserve is run by the Wapley Bushes Conservation Group, a small group of volunteers.

Tuesday, June 14, 2011

Report from work morning 8 May

A long overdue report from our last workday (pressure of work!)

Building up the dead-hedge

We carried out a variety of tasks. The big job was clearing up a quantity of branches that local vandals had chopped down in the Centenary Wood ready for setting fires, and tidying up the butchered trees. We then took the branches down to the edge of the main woodland facing the Lower Meadow, and used them to build up the dead-hedge.

Dead-hedging, in other words weaving branches between stakes driven into the ground, is a traditional way of creating a natural-looking barrier that also acts as a habitat for small creatures. In time ground plants may grow up over the dead-hedge.

We also cut back some vegetation on the paths, gathered up some litter and cut back the grass around the new fruit trees on the Common.

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