I mean seriously we're still mid global pandemic and under an amber weather warning for the heatwave and yet a seriously cool half dozen Good Gymers rocked up tonight to celebrate the return of Tuesday Night Group Runs.

We'd all arrived warmed up so, after introductions and a risk assessment briefing, we ran up and over Bathwick Meadow to report for duty at The Community Nuttery at Smallcombe - Mary was chest deep in grass and already hard at work when we got there.

Our task host Keith showed the rest of us the ropes of how to sythe and we got stuck in cutting back a path through the long grass - and eventually we'll help to cut back the whole area so it's cleared for the National Trust to seed with wild flowers. This was Jamie's first group run and he got the 'outstanding in his field' award for this run report pun.

'Here we go round the Mulberry Bush, The mulberry bush. The mulberry bush. Here we go round the mulberry bush. On a cold and frosty morning.'

(Helen's was a close second but missed out for lack of seasonality but have added the nursery rhyme lyrics above as a midweek ear-worm for those of us old enough to recognise it!)

After raking up and topping up the compost heap our hard work in the heat was rewarded with a delicious apple juice / cider beverage and the buzz from the satisfaction of a task well done (alongside the tingle of a gazillion nettle stings!)

Thanks to everyone for coming out and giving your all on such a hot night, it was a great way to mark the comeback of Group Runs.

We made our way down the canal path to the community orchard at Dry Arch growers in Bathampton to help their team with the autumn harvest.

We were really pleased to welcome Maryam along to her first GoodGym run. It was really good to have you join us and we hope you will return again to help us out!

There were several tasks to do on this crisp autumnal day. First we had to pick the bramley apples from the big tree by the entrance. The apples on lower branches were fine and we managed to do those quite quickly - the challenge came with the branches above! The tree is about 20m high so we had to use the extended apple pickers to carefully pluck them from the branches.

After we had picked the apples we washed them, pulped them and then pressed them. The apples we pressed will be mixed with a slightly sweeter variety to make cider! The cider is 'made' by allowing the juice of the apples to ferment and just sit there in the barrels for a few months. We must have been about 50 litres while we were there and the team were going long after we left them.

At the end of session we took the leftover apple pulp to feed to the chickens that live there. They enjoyed their sweet treat and ate right of our hands!

It was a very mindful morning and we all felt invigorated afterwards. Keep an eye out for more tasks at Dry Arch in the coming months!

This Saturday morning we headed to Smallcombe Nuttery for the fourth weekend in a row to complete our job of scything the orchard.

We have been cutting down the grass there each week to make the nuttery more accessible to walk around and to appear more tidier and maintained. Also, this paves the way for the areas between the trees to become a wildflower meadow at some point in the future (a future task for us to get involved in!).

Today we had the very top of the orchard to cut and lots of areas around the sides. These sections were the hilliest so we had our work cut out for us (no pun intended!).

With a huge effort from everyone involved we managed to get it all cut down and raked away to the side. It looked absolutely fantastic and we were really pleased with our efforts. Keith brought some fresh pressed apple juice (made from some Beauty of Bath apples we picked at Bath Organic Group a few weeks ago).

This morning we met up with some volunteers from Transition Bath to cut the grass at the nuttery at Smallcombe Vale, on the Bath Skyline Walk. We continued with our previous efforts of scything back the waist-high grass and raking it all off to compost at the edge of the field.

This was our third weekend and we managed to cut a large swathe of grass in the middle of the nuttery. There was a big focus this week on not just getting it done, but getting it done well to make sure the grass was cut at an even level.

We were on the lookout for mini-beasts of all varieties, having found some toads last time. We thought we were going home without a sighting, but right at the end of the session a magnificent dragonfly landed on a scythe cover for us all to enjoy.

At the end of the session Keith and Tim, our hosts, kindly offered us some freshly pressed apple juice and recently picked apples from one of the orchards they maintain. It had been a tiring morning so we were glad of the sugar boost. True to form, Keith spent some time insisting that passing members of the public take some of the apples that he had brought along - what a true gentleman.

Next Saturday we are going to finish the job - we only have one section at the top of the field remaining. See you there!

This was our third effort of mowing the grass at Smallcombe Nuttery, following on from our previous sessions in recent weeks:

• Scything in the Rain (what a wonderful feeling!), and
• Getting in to the swing of things

Today our team was bolstered by three new scythers: Apurva, Cosmo and Sophie.

The route to Smallcombe Vale takes you over the beautiful Kennet and Avon canal, where I'd already encountered a family of swans together with a heron guarding the lock gates, on my way to the task.

With a bigger crowd than ever, we had just enough equipment to go around, with 5 GoodGymers setting about scything, 2 rakers, and our host Keith as a kind of floating instructor/coach/manager/blade sharpener/chatter kind of character - which one suspects is his favourite role.

I overheard all sorts of coaching gems, but a couple which spring to mind are :

• "That's an ambitious scything stroke there, well done."
• "Are you right handed? The safest way to sharpen a scythe is if you're a left-hander.."

Next time, I'm thinking on putting a microphone of Keith, and have him dictate the run report... it'll be much more entertaining than this!

Along the way we found, rescued, and photographed (one of) a couple of tiny little toad friends.

I have a confession to make. In last week's run report for this task, I rather embarrassingly left the job of raking the cuttings up as a kind of footnote paragraph, right at the end of the report ("... and Emily raked up the cuttings").

This week, when I arrived (late) all the scythes were taken, and I joined Emily on raking duty. I have to say, raking is the much harder of the two tasks, and is a highly skilled asset to be prized on this task - it involves: safely and skillfully raking over the entire site, hence much more moving around; having to carefully get in and around active scythe blades to make the scythers' jobs easier; and with the help of a tarpaulin, with Emily's guidance we managed to rake and drag 3 sessions-worth of cuttings into a huge pile on the edge of the site.

Power to the rakers!

Coming up...

Overall, we've probably now tidied about two thirds of the nuttery site. So expect to see at least one more session in the listings. Possibly it'll be this coming Saturday, depending on weather.

This morning four GoodGym runners set off to Smallcombe Vale to help Keith and Tim out with another round of grass cutting at the community nuttery there.

This is just the most delightful setting for any mission - there's surely a good reason why Smallcombe Vale is the only place the Bath Skyline walk drops down from above (other than access from the town, of course). The Skyline footpath passes directly down the side of the nuttery.

The grass in the nuttery has been left to grow during the pandemic lockdown, so is pretty long by now and we were again cutting it with scythes.

This is one of those tasks which is simple enough to get going on, but commands your attention throughout. The feedback you get from the scythe action tells you whether you're doing it right on not - you just feel it. When it works well it's almost no effort at all (it's all in the hips apparently). And of course you have to pay attention because you're wielding an enormous sharp knife!

If there is any activity better designed for undertaking during a period of mandatory social distancing, I've yet to find it. When you're all mowing grass by whirling round enormous razor sharp (don't ask how I know) blades on the end of nearly 2 metre long sticks, you definitely want to give plenty of space between you and your nearest neighbours.

With that in mind we just kind of randomly scythed our way up the hill the nuttery is situated on, in a safely-distanced pattern. We've made good work of the lower levels now, but there is still scope for more work to continue all the way up the hill. Watch this space for more missions!

Behind us, Emily did a great job of raking up all the mowings into enormous piles between the trees.

At the end we were treated to the entertainment factor of Keith trying to offload an enormous crate of damsons onto every passing Skyline walker who'd listen to him as we packed up the equipment into his car. And there was one last GoodGym good deed for the day... pushing Keith's car back out of the field.