The Aston's Eyot Triathlon: Scything, Digging and log-carrying. It'll be a Commonwealth Games sport one day you know!

We spent our evening working around the new wildlife pond on Aston's Eyot - digging nettle roots out of the area where the Friends of Aston's Eyot plan to create a boggy area, scything and raking up nettles to try and encourage greater biodiversity, and moving logs to create suitable habitats for reptiles to hibernate (and to clear them from a new footpath).

Aston's Eyot used to be a rubbish dump, so there's lots of Victorian trash all over just below the surface, which makes digging and weeding a bit of a treasure hunt. Who could have predicted that we would be unearthing an old laxative bottle and taking it home to use as a vase? Hopefully the digging team won't get prosecuted for their efforts by Christchurch college - the sign prohibiting digging looked pretty ancient!

Scything is a GoodGym right of passage, so we're always delighted to have a chance to show our newer members how to do it. Fortunately this load of nettle scything didn't seem to trigger everyone's allergies like it did when we scythed nettles in June before. Good to know August is better for the hayfever sufferers!

Well done on reaching the 10 Good Deeds milestone Laurie.