February was all about using workboat ‘Skippy’ to facilitate vegetation management. The boat is essential where trees need to be accessed on the offside or where arisings need to be transported away from the onside.
The first task party set about the onside and offside cutting above top lock. Several small trees that were leaning out across the canal were removed along with growth encroaching on the towpath. Most of the onside arisings were transported to the offside and 'eco' stacked.
An early start on the second task party saw the crew of 8 cutting back the brambles at Butchers bridge. This was followed by pruning the bay tree below lock 1 and collecting the remaining hedge clippings, left by the contractors, at lock 2. Cutting back the overhanging willow branches at lock 5 was next. All the arisings were deposited on the scrubland behind the hedge. The final task was to clear the brambles and overhanging branches from below the bridge at lock 6. A lot was achieved considering 'Skippy' broke her gear selector cable. Thanks to a spare cable supplied by Jonno at UUC, the team managed to fix her while the volunteer work continued.