Spring has morphed into summer with its combination of sunny and rainy days. You’ll know from your own gardens, how fast weeds grow in these conditions and that, despite your best efforts, will keep returning.
Now consider the task of maintaining approximately four miles of tow and foot paths plus several fields that we are responsible for. We must keep them passable and safe for members of the public to walk and cycle along, perform maintenance, whilst not disturbing wildlife and keeping plenty of wild flowers for pollinating bees and other insects.
We’ve been fortunate in the last two months to have several corporate groups who come during the week for a team building and giving back day or two, along with a church group one weekend, to supplement the Saturday team of Trust and Duke of Edinburgh volunteers.
Without the support of the corporate volunteers, many of whom return each year, we would be overwhelmed. Special mention to our Bill and Roger who labour on at Summerhill keeping vegetation at bay, which threatens to engulf the canal bed there.
Work has been divided into three elements:
- Maintaining footpaths along Summerhill, Fosseway Heath, Falkland Road, Gallows Reach, Darnford Park, Darnford Moors, and Borrowcop Locks; cutting back brambles; and trimming hedges.
- Refreshing the look of the area around Borrowcop Locks by laying and flattening grit on the towpath past Bobbie’s Bend (finishing work started by London Waterway Recovery Group earlier in the year), removing trees that were growing into brickwork of the locks, clearing debris from the locks, installing new scaffold fencing and oiling benches to preserve them.
- Investing for the future – planting 110 fruit trees donated by our local Co-op.
The majority have been planted in our nursery at Darnford Moors along with 400 other saplings received earlier in the year. A smaller number were planted near lock 26 in Borrowcop Locks Canal Park next to another established sapling nursery. Once these trees and saplings are strong and healthy, they will be transplanted into the various hedgerows along the canal and our other sites, most likely in autumn 2026. Thank you to our DofE volunteers, pupils from Queen’s Croft School and the Walsall Adventist Group for their labour in performing the planting in unforgiving soil.
A couple of koi have taken up residence in the canal at Darnford Moors plus a pair each of ducks and moorhens.
The heron continues to thrive by Borrowcop Locks feeding on the small fish (and occasional young moorhens) there. We have also experienced the presence of foxes, rabbits and a young fawn around Borrowcop and our compound.
Once again we are appealing for volunteers to join the Green and Grounds team, giving whatever time you can. It can be hard work, but very rewarding, with praise and encouragement from the many members of the public using the towpaths.
Philip Skelton
Green and Grounds team leader
This first appeared in Cut Both Ways, our members’ magazine.
For more recent photos, follow our Facebook page.
