I arranged to meet my pal Phil to start work on his shavehorse now that we had a nice larch plank. The weather forecast wasn’t great but we had the shelter to keep dry. As well as it being a place to get out of the rain, I want it to be a workshop for woodworking and maybe some blacksmithing, so it was nice to have a guest who could make use of it. As we stepped out of the cars, I could see Phil looking intently at something on the ground. It was a mole hill with a pile of poo on it. I would have assumed a walker’s dog had kindly left it but Phil identified it as fox poo. Apparently they will defacate onto a mound or high point as a way of marking their territory. Close inspection shows hair and small bone and what appears to be a tooth. A quick Google of small animal teeth likely to be it’s prey suggest it could be a mole. It might not be a pleasant subject but the implication of it for a nature lover is rewarding. We know I have a fox visitor from my trailcam shots but the territory marking suggests it is a regular haunt for it. If you find photos of poo offensive, look away now!

We had a walkabout noticing how much the ground cover is starting to emerge and a few leaves starting to open on some of the trees before setting up our workshop at the shelter and starting the job of drilling the plank with three holes for the legs. It had to be a hand drill of some sort and we opted for Phil’s large scotch eyed auger. It was very hard work and reminded us of how life was for wood workers before power tools.

Another nature loving woodland neighbour turned up and we headed off to see the bees in the owl box. No sign of them but I’m hoping they had simply hunkered down for the bad weather which was brewing. The bonus was spotting three roe deer running through the woods below us, they were heading for shelter under some large yew trees. We watched for a while then tried to get nearer. They must have seen us and ran off again.

The skies were darkening, the wind blowing and rain and hail came. We headed back to the shelter and three like-minded people chatted about woodlands, wildlife, bushcraft and camping for a long time as the weather threw a bit of everything at us, finally subsiding and letting the sun come through. A break for lunch in the warming sun was very welcome.

With the holes drilled, Phil set to work using my shavehorse to shape the ash logs that would make the legs while I started work on making a heavy mallet out of a piece of the hawthorn that had fallen a few weeks ago. We worked quietly, enjoying the sunny woodland setting and sounds of the birds – robins, nuthatches and the melancholy mewing call of a buzzard overhead. We were both in our elements. Phil demonstrates here how the shavehorse leg can double up as a false leg should he be unfortunate to lose one of his own.

As usual, time simply flies at the woods and before long it was time to start packing up. The new shavehorse now has legs. I was hoping we could have done a bit more work but for now it can keep mine company in the shelter.