All in a 'Clays' work

If you have visited Yarner Woods recently you will have noticed that our pond water level has dropped more than usual. It was our task was to try to investigate why this had dropped so much and then mitigate the problem. This was an excuse for our Tuesday volunteer group to get their hands dirty or rather ‘clayey’ and do a bit of clay puddling around where we thought the source of the leak was. The clay was delivered and dumped in the morning, 4 tons of it! The volunteer group, along with a few others, then proceeded to cut clay with shovels and roll it down the bank to be placed and squelched into position. “You can almost relate the process to stepping on grapes in wine production” one said.  

We believed the source of the problem to be where the overflow pipe was situated, this was where our efforts were focused. As the clay went in, the water level rose. This meant that by the end our volunteers were wading to nearly waist height in water, unless they fell in that is! We are waiting to see if this has made a significant change, but at least we now know that the area is watertight. If it continues to decline then more action will need to be taken, however this was a fun day and one to get stuck into, quite literally. Washing off after a day stuck in the clay. (Photo James Rogers)