Sunday, March 2, 2014

March 2014 - aquatic weed, verbena and more things.


 What  a busy time we have had at the Park so far this year
so there are a LOT of photos

 The Florence Bloom dam had a few pockets
of hyacinth so they were cleared --

but we noticed a strange aquatic grass in the water.
It needed to come out.


Eddy with a "forkfull" of the grass

    We were alternating daily between the aquatic grass in the dam 
and the verbena in the grassland below the school


Wilson and Shepherd at work


A day's work and the one of many, many piles
 of verbena drying.
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 back at the dam....

Shepherd doing a Javelin throw - with a rake!



And the"rakeful" of "grass" being hauled up the dam wall



The heap of the strange grass


We were winning but the rains we had been waiting for arrived --
200mm in five days and Geoff asked us to concentrate
on the verbena while the ground was soft.

With all the rain came a seldom seen sight --
 the dam overflowing


And bottom dam even had a waterfall!

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Meanwhile there were  a few other little things that happened in the park

Elizabeth and I checked the top dam for hyacinth
and only managed a  rather pathetic 23 plants 
Success at last?

Another dumping of bathroom tiles and half a basin

A lady runner was caught sawing through
the poles at the end of the re-surfaced lane!
Apparently they slowed her running time down!
A temporary repair was needed.

*********


The much smaller area of black jacks was
cleared as they started flowering --
 so almost a success there.

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We had a sign made to request the runners on a
Saturday morning not to park inside the park!
 They took no notice ...


So we bolted a chain across and it is locked
on Friday evening to late Saturday morning.

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Bridge repair by Peter and Volcar

The pedestian bridge behind the playground was damaged
 when the supporting wall collapsed from flood water
due to the heavy rains

We borrowed a ratchet hoist to raise it back level


The supporting pole was slotted in


A steel rod was hammered through the two poles


 Nuts were placed on either end to tightened the poles together.


This tree's roots were pushing the supporting wall's
 bricks out, so it had to come down.


It fell exactly where we had planned!


Now the tree was used to make the railings.


Voila! a strong and rustic looking bridge!
Well done Peter and Volcar.

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Back to the verbena story ....
. We now have regular small group of volunteers
 who add to the youngsters coming in.


 22  boy and girl Scouts came into the
 Bird Sanctuary to pull verbena out.

What a huge pile they removed!

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St Stithians arrived

St Stithians came and even the toddler helped.
It just shows you are never to young to work!


Look what we did!

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Next was Trinityhouse High

Another weekend Trinityhouse High who came
and did their two hours of community service.

 

They were rightly proud of their efforts.

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The grasslands below the school  are clear!
Wow--At the bottom of the cleared field.
Then the workers went around the corner and are working
their way towards the Enviroment Center.



 The workers continue to ring the grasslands
with the piles of verbena they take out daily

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So you can see how busy the last two months have been-
and all very productive!

All this could not have been done without the kind
and very generous donations so many of you have given
 so I can employ the workers .
Thank you all so much.
Shirley