James and Linda cycled up to the SHP Allotments arriving super early and were welcomed by a cheeky robin bold as brass in the shed…I’ve contacted SHP about getting that roof fixed.

As our other two signups were new and we would be working slightly obscured from the entrance we decided to grab some rubbish bags and gloves to “loiter pick” near the gates. Luckily there wasn’t much litter this time as Jamie and Lutfir …welcome to GoodGym Guys…soon arrived waving their gardening gloves and ready to go.

Introductions to each other and to the allotment area done we set about our usual tasks of clearing weeds round fruit trees, which proved troublesome as some paths through the brambles needed to be cut to get to them. Jamie was on his third tree when he was caught by the notorious red ants…I really must remember to warn people about those…sorry Jamie. Lutfir took over cutting a path through to the fruit tree at the back, while James was maintaining the path to the watering tank and Linda rescued a walnut tree sapling from being taken over by the dreaded bindweed.

Everyone worked hard and we did quite a bit in the time given but it feels very much like a drop in the ocean as it’s such a large plot. Hopefully the forthcoming meeting with the project manager, permaculture expert and GG representatives will produce some good ideas about how best we can work together to manage the site.

Linda and Jame’s exit from the site was delayed as he had to extract a suicidal slug that had jumped from the walnut tree on to his bike brakes!

Good to see everyone today, great work, hope to see you all again soon.