We've had some beautifully sunny days over the last few weeks and have managed to get the woods ready for the open day, deer fencing finished, bark chip spread, lovely...
Cue the rain... and didn't it rain!
Saturday morning. Started at 9 am putting up the marquee or the "old girl" as she was lovingly referred to. What a sight she was; one of those old fashioned things that are relatively simple and work perfectly! Then the gazebos... arrgghh, I think we erected around 50. Once we'd got into the swing of it and realised which bit went where it was easy. The pegging down was the time consuming part.
I left for a couple of hours, and arrived back at 6pm with a bag of chips and the bed made up in the back of my van, ready to spend the night keeping an eye on our hard work. This seemed like a good idea ... but it rained so much through the night, all night, that even if I'd have had an intruder I would never have heard them over the sound of the unforgiving rain on the roof of my poor old van!! With no trouble during the night, the first thing I knew of any activity was someone in a hi-vis jacket knocking on the window in the morning!!
We began to shovel woodchip; filling in the puddles and bogs that had appeared over night. Then 10am came and in trudged the first visitors - and even though the weather was pretty bad they kept coming. Although I don't think many of the exhibitors sold much, I think/hope they still enjoyed being a part of it.
It should have been a beautiful day, with people sitting around enjoying the fantastic cakes, buying lots of goodies and enjoying the music but the weather did put a slight dampener on things. Fortunately it didn't get the better of a lot of people and I think I speak for all of us when I say a huge thank you to all the people who showed their support and made it as much of a success as it could have been in the circumstances.
Heather, Tiddesley Wood
Our moth trapping at Upton Warren two weekends ago produced two new records for the reserve - puss moth and pale pinion. It was a cold miserable night, saved only by good companionship, and a few good moths.
