Progress with menage & hedge...lots of pictures!

[catembi]

For those unfamiliar with my menage saga... it was installed in December 2007, & as it turns out, v badly installed. The membrane edges weren't sewn, taped or heat sealed in any way, so every single edge came up. In the summer, I began the mammoth task of sewing them all down by hand, & in the process discovered that, far from being clean, washed stone, the drainage layer is in fact random c**p. And not particularly level either.

I can't afford to have it all taken up, & the company who did the work has now closed down & opened another company selling climbing frames, so I'm stuck with it.

Anyway, now that I've fixed the membrane, it was time for a top up. I kinda thought that it would be tipped out on the school so that we could just push it around with the tractor... The first lorry they sent was so huuuuuuuuuuuuge that it couldn't get onto the yard (think supermarket sized artic) so it was eventually delivered in 2 smaller lorries, & resulted in 2 heaps on one short side.

And last year, I found out that S Cambs council did a subsidised hedge scheme for landowners, where you can get a hedge at a reduced price to encourage wildlife, etc. I signed up for it, had a site visit, then we had to pick all the hedge plants upin Feb... all 1,500 of them...!! Sometimes I really don't think these things through. So that took us several w'ends, working around the ground being frozen. With family & friends helping too. OMG, that was a LOT of planting!

So, photos of the projects. They will be huge, I'm afraid, as I cba faffing about on photobucket.

Manege with edges coming up

Dealing with edges (this took FOREVER...9 edges, each 20 metres long...wrecked my hands & took maybe 30 hours in total)

Twin peaks with Trev & Adrian in the background

What we've laid so far, using tractor & wheelbarrow

...and the Twin Peaks don't seem to have got any smaller!

Hedge

More hedge

Even more hedge!

The field's a lot drier now. We're on sand, so it drains pretty well.

And the house is still half renovated, and we might even get around to finishing it if I can stop finding big projects to do outside!

Attic bedroom

T x

 

[Gingerwitch]

Go girl !

Awesome progress

 

[Adopter]

Wow, what a job to tackle, well done.

The hedge will be a great windbreak and help with drainage when it gets bigger, I have a couple of hedges as well as mostly stone walls, and the birds just love them, so much wild life to enjoy when I get a spare minute.

 

[PippiPony]

Wonderful xx

 

[Moggy in Manolos]

Wow you have it all going on there, how exciting though

 

[RichardRider]

Wow you have it all going on there, how exciting though

ditto that...great stuff cats...rr

 

[amandaco2]

Omg the arena sounds nightmare. Bet you were fuming!!! Sounds like a few full time jobs with all those projects on LOL

 

[Slightlyconfused]

Looks great. I bet your glad to finally be finished with the sewing!

 

[catembi]

Oh yes, the sewing... soooooooooooooooooooooooo pleased when I'd finished!

Unfortunately as I had to wait aaaages for the top-up (first had to wait for xmas bonus, then 2 month wait as the woodchip co had a broken chipper & got behind, then hiccup with too-big lorry) the mebrane started coming up AGAIN in places as the surface was too thin to protect it from hooves catching it... You can imagine how much I enjoyed going out there again with my kneeler & fishing line...!

T x

 

[Molasses]

wow lots of hard hard work! go you

 

[hobo]

Good stuff, though can not even imagine doing all that sewing well done. Will look forward to the hedge growing pictures!

 

[blacksabbeth]

I was thinking about this thread the other day and how you were getting on.What a nightmare you have had,but your doing a fab job!Keep it up and you will be there in no time a huge pat on the back and a big well done so far.

 

[LynH]

How long did it take to plant all the hedges and how many people helped? How long a hedge does 1500 plants make?
My fields, six acres, have hardly any shelter and I have been intending to plant a hedge along one or two sides but after seeing my neighbour plant a short hedge I've been putting it off. It is definitely on my list of things to do this year.
Well done with the arena, that looks a sole destroying job hand sewing the membrane but well worth it in the end.

 

[Roasted Chestnuts]

Bleeding heck what a job!

Can't wait to see your finished pictures

 

[Booboos]

Wow that is a lot of work! At least you're getting to the end of it by the looks of things!

I once had to add woodchip to a sand school by hand (no digger, just me and a wheelbarrow) and it took a surprisingly long time!!!!!!!!!! To add insult to injury it made the school really slippery so I had to try to remove it a few months later!

 

[catembi]

LynH - we have 2.5 acres. I had 1,500 hedge plants which was supposed to be 500 metres, altho I didn't measure anything or actually count the plants! The council guy waid there were 1,500.

It took 3 full weekends. They are in staggered rows, so there are 2 rows, 30 cm apart, & the plants in each row are 50 cm apart. It is 2/3 'thorn' which means blackthorn & hawthorn, & 1/3 other stuff. The council chucked in a real mix, including oak, chestnut, silver birch, crab apple, beech etc. It's called the horse mix, & the council vary what they put into the mix dep on your soil & whether it needs to be too spiky to be yummy!

Our soil is very dense, so we had to make the holes by whacking a pole into the ground & wiggling it. 1,500 times! We collected loose earth from molehills to back fill cos it's important not to have air pockets around the plants. Started off with buckets but it was easier to get a load of loose molehill earth in the box thing on the back of the tractor. We got a bulb planter from Amazon for £12 which was fab for the bigger plants. The thorns look like twigs with roots, so only need narrow but deep holes.

Our tried & tested method was to have 2 people whacking holes, then for someone to plonk the plants in the holes using the system thorn-thorn-random other plant, thorn-thorn-random other plant. Then for someone else (me!!!) to backfill all the holes using molehill earth, making sure it was properly pressed down, then for someone else to stake them & put the plastic sleeves on. At one point, there were 6 of us & we were flying; at other times, just me & o/h.

Other jobs that need doing are unravelling the plastic sleeves because they come with 4 rolled up inside each other & need pulling apart, & dumping sleeves, canes & plant bundles at intervals. Tractor box is fab for this. A huuuuge bundle of canes is surprisingly heavy.

We averaged maybe 3 people including us over the duration of the project. It was hard work... & this is from someone who pulled bricks up 2 levels of scaffolding using just a bucket & a rope with no pulley for 8 hours at a time when the roof was off the house!

I was thinking that the cold might have killed it, but I was having a look yest & a lot of the plants are budding & the odd one has a tiny leaf, so fingers crossed!

Right, the manege is calling, boo! I **seriously** hope that mine isn't going to go slippy cos I will NOT be impressed! At least I'm burning off lots of Easter eggs!

T x