Busy Weekend

OK. I finished pollarding the old willows by the pond. The take from that is going to be a lot of crappy firewood and a lot of waste, unless I can make faggots. The sanest use for the land we have would be to grow enough willow or poplar to fire a woodchip boiler -- as we burn oil at the moment that's twelve or sixteen hundred savings from something that currently yields nothing.

The big winds last week blew out some of my dodgier hedgelaying, so I've put that back. And I've planted another twenty-five hazels on a rather tight spacing. When they're established I'm putting in ash behind them with a view to eventual firewood coppice.

And I put in seventy-five hornbeams for Mrs U's garden.

Just one magic point: if you've struggled as I have to put bare-root trees into heavy clay you need this spade or one like it. If you want to let the plants in down the back of the spade in the traditional way, and you're strong enough to open up the slits in the soil, the metal shaft means you can push as hard as you need without breaking the handle off, and if you do decide to dig a trench, it needn't be a wide one. You'll need metal re-inforced boots to use it though -- and be prepared to jump on it to get it in to clay.