The warm, dry spring weather has continued and given us a good run at the project plot. It also seems to have been good for butterflies. After hearing the reports of how bad the last couple of wet springs have been, it was heartening to see Small Tortoiseshells fluttering about – although sadly they don’t sit still long enough to get a photo…!

This week, we had the compost for the raised beds delivered and, on Sunday morning, volunteers with barrows set to work and the beds are now filled. We laid cardboard in the base to cover the compacted rubble, and then each bed had 4-5 barrows full of woodchip (a mix of fresh and well-rotted) before the compost was added on top. We used a coir-based peat-free compost from Fertile Fibre, which is specially blended for raised beds. (On this occasion we had to choose bagged, rather than plastic-free, compost because it was a mid-week delivery and we didn’t know how close to the site the delivery van would be able to get.)

We have also made a start on customising the shelter – the first thing we have added is a bench which, as the photos prove, is strong enough for nine*!

(*For the sake of accuracy, although it looks like nine people sat on the bench at once, we only actually tested it with eight people – one person had to take the photo and then got edited in!)

Thanks to Paul, Jo, Gerard, Abdo, Sajjad, Afzal, Derek, Janet & Kuda for their work today.