Scything team in action

All change on Butterfly Bank last week. Having done a days training in the Arnside & Silverdale AONB a few weeks ago we borrowed a set of scythes and hayrakes. On one of the better days, with help from a couple of other would be reapers from LESS we managed to give the whole bank a short back and sides.

The scythes are Austrian and are being promoted in the UK by Simon Fairlie from Monkton Wyld Community in Dorset. They are much easier to use than 'English' scythes - something to do with weight and balance. We borrowed them from The Lancashire Wildlife Trust who are getting together a North Lancs Meadows group and hope in the future to recruit a posse of volunteer reapers who would go out and hand cut small meadows in the area.

While I was sharpening one of the scythe blades a group of teenage lads went by the last one throwing me the comment of "awesome weapon!" as he passed. Next year we may be organising a 'Strictly Come Scything' party as I learnt from a friend at the Glasson music festival that scything was traditionally done to music - the last Piper in the North West being recorded as playing for a scything team in Ulverston in the late 1790's.

Chris

Down at the other end of the site in the mill garden, another set of people has been busy. Pete and Geoff prepared a bed for shrub cuttings, and Kate put in 28 flowering currant cuttings. Other passing cohousing members were surprised to see that flowering currant has berries similar to edible currant. No one tasted them!

Some of these passers-by were tempted to try their hand at some gardening work too. James was found a task which could be done without bending his bad back - cutting privet, and Pam and Gill took over removing the cut branches to pile on top of the windrow, which has suddenly become all green and leafy again as a result.
Kate