Well where did Summer go so fast? The clocks have gone back to GMT and for me, that signals the end of summer, light nights and the closing down of Mother Nature for a few months. Still there is plenty of greenery and new growth in my woods as well as some lovely autumn colours.

I went there yesterday to do some felling. My chainsaw’s brake broke last time and now I’ve fixed it, I wanted to get busy with some more thinning. I was feeling a bit “trigger happy” – keen to make some more changes but settled on a small, ungainly sycamore with two trunks. It’s close to my work area where I often sit with a mug of coffee and just enjoy the scenery. There’s a decent sized hazel beneath it that is shaded out in summer. Removing the sycamore means it will allow more sunlight in and I could coppice the hazel which will add interest to the area. I only intended removing one of the trunks but it fell onto the other and snapped it off, in hindsight it needed to come down. I cut the hazel down too and another small one nearby. It’s surprising how much work is involved cutting up the trees and clearing the brash and how much different it looks now.

My neighbours came and did some felling in their plot. They have a lot of youngish cherry that needs thinning. Even though young, they are pretty tall and inevitably get hung up in nearby trees. I helped them free them and they were difficult to get down. Bigger trees are easier as the extra weight means they crash through rather than get stuck.

The other job I wanted to do was take the seasonal fixed point photos for the Woodland Trust project. I now have four sets of photos taken at six different locations. Three of them are in my plot. It’s fascinating to see the changes through the year. I’ve uploaded each of my three locations to Flickr so they run through each one and through the four seasons. Here’s the link. Look for the small icon top right that looks like a tv with an arrow in it. Click on that to run the photos as a slide show so you can see the changes at each one and enjoy the woodland journey.

The four seasons

I picked my eldest daughter up yesterday and headed for the woods for a Dad and Daughter day. She’s been a few times before but not at this time of year. She likes to get stuck in and help with jobs, not frightened to get her hands dirty or spiked with brambles. The day started out bright but it was due to deteriorate later. I wasn’t too focussed on work, wanting to enjoy the company and show her around. She’s always had an interest in small living things. As a young child she loved looking into rock pools and once built a small bug home at the bottom of the garden out of pebbles sticks and leaves. I love showing people around the woods and pointing out some of the easily overlooked features that are not obvious to the casual observer.

There’s a real autumnal feel there now though most of the trees are still pretty green. It will all change in a few weeks. We did a bit of bramble pulling, log stacking and brash clearing. These tasks seem dull and laborious but can be quite cathartic. Working your muscles doing “real” work, engaging with the land and nature produces a calm satisfaction. We talked about the feelings we both get there, of somehow belonging to the woods rather than the other way around. It’s hard to explain to someone who hasn’t experienced it. You don’t get the same depth of belonging when casually walking through a public wood. I think the connection comes when you work in it and even more so when you start to know it quite well.

I’d spotted some neighbours’ car earlier so we had a walk around to theirs to say hello. They remarked that there were lots of fungi around this year. I haven’t seen much in mine but their patch is predominantly coniferous – larch and Corsican pine, whereas mine is broadleaf. The top layer of soils are not the same due to the different leaf litters so that may account for it. This little fungi was only a couple of centimetres in size and growing on a stump. The colour is amazing and it looks almost like a sea anemone.

These tiny bracket fungi can be seen in my woods growing on dead wood. This is a hazel stake used to support a tree guard.

As the afternoon progressed, it became very windy. Quite unnerving working beneath sixty feet high lanky trees that are flapping about. Time to head home.

I arrived nice and early yesterday to a warm and peaceful woodland. Armed with chainsaw I intended doing lots of work. I’d been awake since about 4 am with an airport run to do, so was feeling quite tired. After a quick scout around I made a coffee and just sat, enjoying the tranquility of the place and planning my work. I wondered how many people were lucky to be doing that right now. So much to do now the summer is over but I shall try to stick to my plan of concentrating on the areas I’ve already done work on, keeping them free of bramble etc. So I spent an hour pulling it up in the hazel copse before setting to with chainsaw to start cutting up the large sycamore that was felled in spring. I’m going to leave a big piece of it to slowly rot but I sliced a few pieces off it and split some down for stool seats. Due to hidden knots I only managed to get a couple of suitable pieces. I spent some time cutting up dead branches into firewood.

I texted one of the woodland neighbours to see if he was likely to be here and was pleased when he replied that he was coming. I headed over to his place early afternoon to look for him. His camp is very well hidden and it took some time to locate him. We spent a good hour chatting about woodlands, bushcraft, camping and the joy of collecting pebbles off beaches with our children. On the way back I met another neighbour briefly who was busy burning some woodland litter. They have a lot of laurel which they are trying to eradicate. It’s an invasive species and tends to toxify the soil around it. It contains cyanide and should not be burnt until completely dried out.

I was looking for some nice fungi to photgraph but surprisingly found little in my plaot. I did find this beautiful array of birch polypore though. It has a nice smooth, dry rubbery texture and is one of my favourites.

By the time I got back it was mid afternoon and I decided to fell a couple of small sycamore. It didn’t go well. My chainsaw was struggling to cut and the tree also got hung up in another one. I threw a rope over it and with some hefty sideways pulling it came down. I was very tired and that’s a good time to stop and packed up for an early finish.

The party’s over – the one we call summer has quietly slipped by and autumn is here. Workwise, I’ve been taking things a bit easy the last few months but the arrival of October reminds me that I need to get busy again and do some hard graft. There’s still plenty of green growth and activity around and because we have such mild seasons now, it’s all too easy to think that we have plenty of time to do the felling etc before spring, so the next couple of months can slip by too if we’re not on the ball.

Yesterday I set myelf the task of clearing up the hazel coppice area. Brambles have taken a hold again and I decided that precious time spent clearing them, might be better spent by keeping a few small areas as clear as possible, rather than trying to tackle too much and doing it badly.

The sun was just hitting the tops of the trees and I watched as numerous crows were circling and cawing loudly at each other. A flurry of small birds heeded the warning and scurried into the cover of the brash and dense trees. My connection with the woods was made again and I was ready to work. Much pulling, moaning and a bit of swearing followed for an hour or so. As usual I had understimated the task and instead of clearing the whole coppice area, I managed about a quarter of it. Here’s the evidence.

Time for coffee and some photography. There’s not as much fungi around as I expected but I did find some nice examples. This one is birch polypore also called razor strop fungi. It grows on decaying birch and has healing properties, strips can be cut to make natural sticking plasters (band aids if you live in the USA) and it’s a favourite with bushcrafters.

These tiny ones I can’t identify, they are incredibly delicate and fairies use them as umbrellas.

I have never seen these before, they were growing on dead birch. They are no bigger than a pea and an incredible salmon-pink in colour. Initial research suggests they might be cinnabar polypore in their very early stages.

The other main job was to create a small secure area in a well lit place, to act as a nursery for saplings. There is a dark area that was used to rear pheasants, and now that they have gone, there is lots of regeneration happening but I have plans to do some heavy felling there which might damage them. They are also vulnerable to deer browsing. The coppice area (first photo) is fantastically light and ideal for a nursery. I cleared the area between two hazel bushes (which also need deer protection) and enclosed a decent sized piece with netting. I transplanted about 15 saplings from the dark area (still lots more) which included hazel, beech, oak, hawthorn and wild cherry. When the felling is complete I can move them back or use them in other areas.

Time to get the chainsaw out soon.

Two days ago I met some guys from the Woodland Trust and a photographer at my woods. They have asked me to feature in a short, case study video which they will post on their website. The Heritage Lottery funded five-year project that they have been running, is coming to an end in December and I guess they want to show how they have helped small ancient woodland owners like myself.

I got there early to prepare, put my tarp up in case it rained, cleaned the composting toilet (in case somebody had had a dodgy curry the night before) and lit a fire.

It was a relaxed and informal questions and answers session. They interviewed me first, then Robin (the WT project officer who has been advising me since I bought the woods). I made a brew and provided biscuits and we got to work. Here is Robin being interviewed. I meant to ask him to take some shots of me but in the excitement, completely forgot.

I was told to face the interviewer and talk to him rather than the camera. He said that he would mostly be edited out and so my answers needed to include the questions so that they were relevant. It was quite challenging for a novice, phrasing my answers intelligently and clearly whilst trying to remember what he had asked. With no interjections (like you would have in a normal two-way conversation) there is a tendency to run out of steam and start waffling (something I’m quite good at). There were no double takes so I guess I did OK but I won’t be winning any Oscars. They have also asked me to write a short guest blog to put on their website with the video once it has been edited and approved by myself. I’ll post it here when it’s done. Another interesting by-product my woodland adventure. What other paths might it take me down?

The guys left early afternoon and a touch of sadness descended on me. Robin has been holding my woodland hand (figuratively speaking) since I bought the woods just over two years ago. He’s been a tremendous support, a mentor and catalyst to my new woodland management role. I knew nothing about it three years ago and he has organised seminars, demonstrations and trips to other woods which I have enjoyed immensely. At the end of the year his contract with the WT ends. He has become a friend and I shall miss his visits. I want to say a big thanks for all he’s done.

I hadn’t planned any jobs for the day so I spent an hour or so packing up and taking a few photos. I sat on my bench just enjoying the peace and tranquility. A large dragonfly arrived and cruised around the area catching small flies. It flew around a regular route passing me closer and closer (they like to check you out). It passed my face inches away then finally left. I did too.

Autumn is coming and so soon it will be time to get busy with the chainsaw again for another round of felling and thinning out.

The huge broken sycamore limb that had got hung-up early in the year has freed itself saving me the job. Last visit I spent a good hour or so trying to get a line over it to pull it out but with no success. Here it is on the ground.

Some of you might remember my first solo camp when I had a terrible nightmare. It happened again. I was undecided about telling all and sundry about my insecurities but I have no ego to protect and it might be of interest, especially if you have had similar experiences or are considering solo camping. I’m interested in human psychology to some extent and it’s part of my curiosity about “life, the universe and everything” (Douglas Adams – Hitchhikers Guide to the Universe). I’m no expert psychologist (Google is my tutor) but this is what I think might explain my experiences. If you are an expert and think this is a load of cobblers, please enlighten me. Obviously the nightmares are based on deep-seated insecurities. Come on, who wouldn’t feel a little nervous about sleeping solo in the middle of a dark wood protected by a wafer thin layer of polyester? I’ve said it before, I am not frightened of any animals that might be around in the UK. The most fearsome species in my book are homo sapiens and they can be particularly nasty animals. My fears are based on possible intruders – not necessarily intent on doing physical harm, but causing mischief to me as a form of sadistic entertainment.

I wasn’t feeling nervous at all, having camped several times now but lets examine the human psyche a little deeper. There’s a part of our brain that is ancient in origin called the amygdala and is responsible for our personal safety. It reacts to danger and gives us the fight or flight mechanism. It doesn’t understand logic you can’t reason with it because it can’t distinguish between real or perceived threats.

Now let’s look at another fancy word, hypnagogia which is the transitional stage between wakefulness and the onset of sleep (or vice versa). Associated with that are feelings of being awake and asleep at the same time, sometimes accompanied with feelings of paralysis, chest crushing, hallucinations and lucid dreams (clear, realistic). I have had that on occasions when my mind has been overactive at bedtime or something is worrying me. It can be terrifying because your conscious mind is still partly functioning and you think you are awake and experiencing your nightmares for real.

I fell asleep fairly quickly. In that type of environment, the senses are heightened and the amygdala seems to be more alert than when safely tucked up in bed at home. Primitive man had to be that way and would wake regularly after short periods of sleep in order to stay safe from predators etc. Modern man is not all that far removed from our primitive ancestors on the total scale of human development. I napped and woke a few times but was wide awake at 3 am. Still not nervous but finding it hard to go to sleep again. I must have drifted off but got stuck in hypnagogia land. Wiki says that sleeping on your back can trigger it and can also account for reports of people feeling that something was crushing them. I know I was on my back at that stage, the most comfortable position when trying to relax. Suddenly it felt like something heavy had landed right on top of the tent and was bearing down on me. Was it a deer that had blundered into my tent? I tried to shove it away and it left. My thoughts were that it would also be scared and not return. It happened again accompanied with laughing. Sh*t, there are people out there. I tried to shout and tell them to go away (in less polite language). I could see shadowy movements through the thin tent walls but it felt like I could hardly speak (paralysis). I tried to open the tent door flaps but struggled to do so. Definitely somebody moving around the tent. This state of hypnagogia is traumatic because your mind is still awake enough to be thinking logically and I was convinced my eyes were open because I could see the inside of the tent clearly. Well after much swearing at imagined intruders, I managed to open the tent and step outside. I found myself by the side of a beautiful river and walked onto an old bridge. It was sunny. Relief came and I must have made the transition into proper sleep because I awoke at 6 am safe and sound in my little tent. I dressed and opened the flaps for real this time, shuffling my bum to the door so I could put my boots on and see my beautiful, benign woodland. Phew.

So if you’ve stayed with me so far, maybe you can sympathize and understand that it’s not just me being a total scaredy cat. It’s an inbuilt mechanism that is there to help protect us from danger but it can easily get it’s wires crossed. Time to light the fire and get a brew going. The sun was up, the smoke drifted through the trees and all was well again.

The tent was wet from rain, I felt chilled out and relaxed but really I was just dead tired, so I spent a leisurely morning packing all my gear up, drying the tent and a few other small woodland jobs. Another neighbour and good friend A. called around. I showed him “Champion the Thunder horse” and he was over the moon because he had given me the larch plank from his woods and was so pleased that I had made something with it. I did some bramble pulling for an hour then headed home. Despite the terrible night’s sleep, I thoroughly enjoyed it. Maybe next time I should have a few more mugs of wine before bedtime.

I bought a new small tent in a sale a while ago. I wanted something smaller and quicker to put up/take down than my main tent. I’ve been wanting to try it out at the woods and also get in another overnighter before the nights really draw in. I received a text message from a woodland neighbour (I shall just refer to him as S. for anonymity) saying he was meeting R. from the Woodland Trust this Wednesday gone and was I likely to be there so we could meet for a catch-up? S. is a keen bushcrafter and naturalist and has made some stunning wildlife videos and I feel we have a lot in common and I wanted to have a good chat with him. I am always pleased to see R. too, so the decision to go camping again was an easy one.

Arriving early again and it wasn’t long before S. came around. We spent a good hour or more chatting about the woods and nature watching and the subject of badgers came up. I said I had never seen a live badger and it’s on my “bucket list” to see one. S. told me he sees them often at some setts lower down the woods and would I like to go tonight when it’s dusk. “Yes pleeeease”.

After clearing my camp area I put the new tent up. It’s very easy and fits in nicely, barely visible from the track.

R. from the W.T. arrived and we had a catch-up too. After lunch I headed over to S.’s for a look around his plot and more woody/nature talk. Nice to meet with someone with the same interest and passion for the subject. A while ago he built a small pond which has had numerous woodland visitors – roe deer, buzzards, foxes and other birds including the South American rhea that was there a few months ago. A small pond  is on my list of projects. It doesn’t look particularly impressive but it’s a valauable source of water in an otherwise very dry woodland.

I returned to my patch and set-to building my fire ready for cooking my evening meal. Camping and cooking in the woods makes you realise how much we take for granted in our efficient, modern lifestyles and how much work is involved. We can fill the kettle from a tap, throw a switch and have a mug of coffee in minutes. We can open the freezer and bung something in the oven, leave it for half an hour or so and come back to a hot meal. Afterwards, stick the dirty crockery in the dishwasher and go watch telly till bedtime. I like this proper camping, with no facilities, because it adds meaningful depth to my life and reminds me of my human-ness. It is empowering to know that if “push comes to shove” and our lovely, convenient, sanitised lifetyle ended for some reason, I have some survival skills that would stand me in good stead. The way we live now is a relatively new concept and in some parts of the world, people still live so close to the land. People will often say that wild camping and bushcrafting is roughing it but my good friend P. likes to say “No, bushcrafting is about smoothing it – learning skills that make life easier in a natural environment. There were no freezers, electric kettles and dishwashers from pre-history up until a hundred years or so ago and most people today wouldn’t have a clue about making a fire from gathered materials and cooking a meal over it . Anyway that’s the reason I like doing this stuff and actually – I do like my modern home comforts very much but it’s nice to go and play at neanderthal man now and then. I made a new cooking tripod from some hazel rods and had my first cook-up on my new fireplace. Tinned curry and pre-cooked rice – ha! Well what else could a semi-veggie do in the middle of some English woods? Nettle soup and a few blackberries aren’t going to fill me up.

It started raining – (thanks BBC, for getting the forecast wrong again). It eased off though and S. arrived and as dusk fell, armed with our binoculars, we headed off to the badger site . He told me that badgers have poor eyesight but sharp senses of smell and hearing, so we had to position ourselves far enough away and downwind to avoid detection. We stood and watched quietly for over an hour but no badgers appeared. A little disappointing but I really enjoyed the experience and having good company for the evening. S. suggested we try again in Spring when there is less foliage and therfor better visibility.

We called it a day around 9 pm and by this time it was pitch black in the woods. I headed back, stoked the fire and enjoyed a mug of red wine with nothing else to do but savour the experience. The moon and stars were clearly visible through the gaps in the canopy and I was alone in the middle of the woods. All was quiet – except for the aircraft and loud motorcyclists (organ donors as my mate calls them) racing along the back roads at breakneck speeds. An odd contradiction. Time to try out my new tent.

It’s a so-called two man tent but maybe it should be called a two sardine tent. It’s fine for one person though quite challenging just getting your muddy boots off in a way that keeps your tent clean, your feet dry and the biting insects out! It’s a case of sitting with your bum just inside the tent and feet outside, then shuffling backwards as you zip up the door flaps. The next challenge is setting up your sleeping mat and bag etc and undressing whilst in a more or less, horizontal position. Not easy for an arthritic 60-odd year old. but please I can still manage it. Come back for part two.

It’s been two weeks since my last visit and I was ready for my “woodland fix”. During the summer, I set off early and when schools are out, the drive is easy and I get a good long day to play in my woods. As I pull up to unlock the main gate, there’s always a lovely feeling of expectation. I know I am going to spend the next seven or eight hours bathed in woodland goodness, free to explore, sit, plan, work or play. I can be spontaneous and indulge myself in “messing about” in the woods. Something we usually stop doing when we reach adolescence.

I drive slowly up the long track to my small woodland haven, park and  turn the engine off and step out. The tall trees are still and dark, towering above me and offer a place of sanctuary and quiet, a welcome relief from the fast-paced roads that brought me here. I savour the day ahead in the same way I might when a plate of delicious food is placed in front of me. I start as usual with a slow walk around my paths. What has changed since last visit? The sun streams through the tall lanky sycamore trees, reflecting off the bramble and ferns. Leaves and spider webs shine bright through the backlit sun and I think to myself once again “how lucky I am to have this”.

Since my last visit, I have been busy at home building pieces for “Champion” – my shavehorse and I was keen to fit them to the bench and complete the project. It’s been a challenge but I have taken my time and worked on it carefully. It would be so easy to make one mistake and ruin hours of work. The main task was to drill a hole through the body to take the wooden pin that will allow the frame to pivot. Sounds easy enough but it’s 8 inches wide and done with a hand auger. The challenge is to align it correctly so it comes out of the other side at right angles to the bench and level with the entry hole. I clamped some straight pieces of wood to it as guide lines so I could “eyeball” the auger against it and stay straight. It worked and relief washed over me. Now the fun part, fitting the frame and platform and trying it out. It works a treat. I am so happy with it and the satisfaction of making a working tool completely from scratch and with materials from the woods, is enormous.

My next door woodland neighbours arrived and made coffee. We took them to the shavehorse for me to show them and demonstrate and R. had a little go on it. After a bit of catch-up, we split and headed off to pursue our own agendas. I wanted to cover my large firewood stacks now that they are nicely seasoned and dry. I’m hoping to bag some of it to sell. A while later I met up with them again and we lit a Swedish fire torch. Basically it’s a dry log with slots cut in it. You light a small fire in the centre and it burns from inside to out. You can use the top as a hotplate to cook or boil a kettle on. It took a lot of effort to get it started but it worked. Good as long as you’re not in a hurry for a brew.

The last hour was spent pulling nettles and bramble in the old bird rearing area. Three years ago, very little grew there and I think it was due to the pheasants eating all the seedlings. I am really pleased to say it is recovering nicely. There are ferns, wild raspberries and numerous other new ground cover plants. It’s covered with ash and sycamore saplings. The ash may or may not survive the coming disease (Chalara) and the sycamore is unwelcome there but I spotted lots of other tree species saplings among them – wild cherry, beech, hazel, hawthorn, holly. This area is due to have some large sycamore removed to let light in and when that happens, these saplings will flourish and repopulate the area with more diversity. All in all, another great day at the woods.

The weather has been grim this summer. I was hoping for a one night camp-over this week but yesterday looked like the only dry one. I’m enjoying a more laid back approach at the moment, making sure I do some fun/interesting/stimulating things rather than just essential jobs. A mixture of both is the key. It turned out to be a very interesting and pleasurable day.

I wanted to carry on building Champion (my shave horse) and needed some straight narrow logs to split down to make the arms for the frame part. I knew there was some more dead oak (same as I made the legs from) which might do. The outer is rotten but inside is sound. I set-to, splitting it using metal wedges. The resulting pieces looked OK but there was a lot of “wind” or twist which would make it difficult to work with.

I also knew of a small ash tree that had blown down in spring. I wanted to harvest the tree for projects anyway, so headed off to cut it up and split some. The pieces came out pretty straight so I’ll use that instead of the oak.

The woodland was very wet and big black slugs were everywhere. I came across a pair that were having a bit of “rumpy pumpy”. Slugs are pretty gross at the best of times but somehow they managed to out-gross themselves. Slugs possess both male and female organs and when mating, they fertilise each other. I watched for a few minutes and was surprised at how gentle and tender these creatures seemed to be, almost caressing each other in a sluggy, slow motion fashion. Owning my woods and getting close to nature has changed my perception of wildlife. We see some things as disgusting but really, that’s just superficial. Look beyond the outer appearance and there is beauty to be found. Even in slugs! Yeah OK that one’s going to take a bit of working on.

Whilst eating my sandwich, I heard a loud and constant chirping close by. A young wren hopped around me, oblivious to my presence. They don’t usually get so close, so it was a real pleasure to witness. A treecreeper crept up a tree (nice that some things are predictable in life). I played my birdsong app on my phone of another wren. It always works with these birds, they come out of the undergrowth looking for another bird. I took a walk around another area, at the far side of the wider woods. There, the trees are mainly evergreens – larch and Corsican pine. The feel is very different to mine which is deciduous. The pine trees are incredibly tall and there’s that lovely fresh smell. I heard two buzzards calling nearby. One was flying around but the other was stationery. I couldn’t see it but wondered if it was a young one still in the nest, about to fledge. I called back in my best buzzardy whistle-voice which seemed to invoke a response from it.

Returning to my plot, I stopped to sit in the hazel copse which is now very light and sunny. I sat quietly on the huge, felled, sycamore trunk just absorbing the beauty of the woods. A huge green dragonfly was slowly motoring around the copse, looking like an insect version of a sea-king helicopter. I read somewhere that if you sit still, they will often come to check you out. I was hoping so and it did, hovering several times a few feet in front of me before finally deciding I was too big to eat. I just love the way some animals and insects treat you as a fellow woodland creature. It makes me feel a part of nature and not apart from it.

Back to work on Champion. He/she needed to slim down a bit. I spent time with the axe, trimming the sides to a more comfortable and erganomic shape.

Finally, I got the chance to try out a cheap hammock that I bought a while ago. Sleeping in hammocks is a popular choice with wild campers. They are light to carry and quick to erect and some people swear they get their best night’s sleep in them. As a “side sleeper”, I doubt a hammock would work for me and I’ve never laid in one, so at £10 it was worth getting just to experiment with. My first attempt ended up with my bum touching the floor as the ropes stretched a little. I adjusted the height and clambered back in. It was easier and more stable than expected. I didn’t fall out once! Lying on my back, staring idly up at the trees was an incredibly relaxing experience, only marred slightly by the blood-hungry mossies that thought I was their dinner. I managed to envelope myself almost completely in the material. Better quality hammocks have mosquito nets to keep them out and I can see why some people love them for sleeping in but if you can’t sleep on your back, then forget it. I will use mine just to “hang out” in and enjoy some woodland R&R occasionally.

I finished the day doing some nettle pulling and spotted numerous cherry and hazel saplings, growing in an area that had previously been used for pheasant rearing and where there was virtually no undergrowth – encouraging signs. I headed home having had a fantastic day in my woods.

Forecast for today – fine in the morning showery in the afternoon. I arrived around 7.45 am pausing at the gate to watch a buzzard circling above and calling incessantly. The sun was shining – a good start. My list for the day included lighting a fire, cutting and burning the diseased ash saplings, starting work putting legs on the plank given to me for a shavehorse, trying out my cheapo hammock and cutting some green logs for making shrink pots. Quite a list so I decided to start straight away and make a fire. The ground was wet from recent rain and the new, virgin, stone fireplace was looking dreary. A large black slug was crawling across the hearth. That’s no place for a slug and not how you want to see your campfire. Funny how a fireplace looks so wrong when there’s no fire in it! I wanted to bring it to life for the first time and it would give me chance to burn the diseased ash saplings. I split a few dry logs into kindling and fire was soon warming and blackening the stones. I did remove the slug first in case you were wondering.

Once there was some hot embers, I cut the saplings, chopped them and stuck them on the fire. It looks wrong again doesn’t it, but it soon burnt through them. Cutting and burning them won’t stop the disease but it allows me to more easily see any new victims in the future.

I knew we were in for some rain in the afternoon, so it was a case of getting all the dry-day jobs done first. I cut a young sycamore tree down that was looking weather beaten and sawed some small logs from it to take home to make shrink pots. I think I described these in a previous posting. I’d like to make more.

My shelter has been looking sad recently. The plastic tarp that is the roof, was hanging down in places because little furry creatures have nibbled the jute twine that was securing it, presumably to make nests. I needed to fix it so that when the rain came, I could keep dry and use the time to do some woodworking.

By late morning there was a change in the weather. I brewed some coffee while the fire was still burning and retired to the shelter for lunch. The rain came down in torrents but after an hour it stopped. I took the opportunity to have a walk around and take some photos. This tree was damaged a few months ago in some gales. It’s a double-stemmed sycamore and one half is wedged firmly. I’m still trying to figure the best way to fell the tree to make it safe. It looks puny in the photo but it’s actually about 50-60 feet tall and the split is half way up!

Next job was to start work on the shave horse. I drilled three angled holes in the plank to take the legs. Two at the back and one at the front. Three legs is better than four on uneven ground. The skies darkened again and I knew more rain was coming. I lugged the heavy plank and some pieces of split oak down to the shelter. The oak was part of a dead tree that had blown down in the winter. The outer sapwood was rotten but the inner wood (the heartwood) of oak remains solid for years due to the high tannin content. Ideal for making the legs. They just needed a lot of axe work to trim off the rotten wood and taper the ends to fit the holes in the plank.

So what about the title of this post then? Well the rain came again, this time acompanied with some fantastic thunder. I sat in the dry chopping away at the oak legs while the rain hammered on the newly repaired tarp. I managed to trim the legs down and fit them to the plank. The shave horse was born. What sprang to mind bizarrely, was a song from an old American tv show from my childhood. It was called Champion the Wonderhorse and I could hear the title tune rattling around my head. Brilliant, from now on, the shavehorse will known as Champion the Thunderhorse. Apt too, that today was Yorkshire day and for those who understand the Yorkshire language, I’ll just say that today was “reet champion” and here’s the horse on his three legs just waiting for his saddle.