This week were were back on Everton Brow with John from Friends of Everton Park. Two of us ran the 2.5km from Hope street and met three others there.

We were tasked with removing the self seeded cherry tree saplings and brambles to make way for the wildflowers to flourish. The five of us set to work equipped with heavy duty gloves and an array of secatuers. We quickly removed the majority of the saplings, but there remains a rather large bramble that we have set our sights on for next time!

As we worked we even got chance to admire the wildflowers (particularly the cowslips) and managed to fit in a quick walk up to the top to admire the view! Great work this week!

The nights just get lighter and lighter which is a joy. Tonight we worked on the task in the light AND the dry - wowww!!! When we arrived at the task the LCV crew had been working hard already - we all got stuvk into clearing the litter moss (and dog poo!!) from what turned out to be a lovely cobbled area. The moss was reused by being placed in a nearby field so all the wildlife can continue to make use of this wonderful resource. There were areas of horsetail/marestail and after some googling and allomenteer knowledge we seperated that out to be dealt with on its own. It was a real team effort with people shovelling hoeing sweeping transporting. The time flew past and we have arranged to go back to complete the task next week.

This week 4 runners and 1 cyclist met on Hope street and headed out into the night to meet meet 5 more goodgymmers at Ullet Road Church, where we were tasked with emptying an old storage room.

We made quick work of the 1.8 mile run (turns out having a cyclist as a pacemaker really speeds you up) and arrived at a bustling church hall. At first, the task seemed like a tall order (see the before pic) with the room filled with a miscellany of strange and wonderful items including a bath tub!? We had to manoeuvre each item down a narrow stairway into the basement. But as usual many hands made light work and we were done and dusted in a record 35mins, leaving plenty of time for tea and biscuits.

Thanks so much for all of your hard work. The church will now be able to use this space to store chairs for the many events they hold and will make their lives much easier!

Although the days are getting longer we are still currently meeting in the dark - so it was a dark evening when we met at The Brain Charity to help them tidy up their outside place. Everyone arrived independently - totaling over 19 miles between us of walking and running. We welcomed new members Sarah and Kleanthis to their first task. Great to have them on the team. The tools had been hidden by the staff of the project so uncovering them we soon set about cleaning and clearing the tarmac and beds of leaves and rubbish. Its a big area and our torches picked out the litter but when we started to rake the laves up more and more litter was also found amongst it. We uncovered little plants that will now be able to grow without having to push through the huge blanket of leaves. Sian found a grid under a mound of leaves and earth which will help with drainage when we next have a big spate of rain. Its amazing how much can be done when everyone works together - 13 bags of leaves and 2 bags of litter and even in the dark we could see that we had made a difference. Huge well done to Harriet Pat and Lucien for completing 5 tasks.