West
Vale Branch |
There is not too much to report this month as it has been a time when most of our volunteers get away with family on the annual summer holiday and canal restoration takes a firm second (or even third) place in the list of priorities.
The warm, sunny days encourages plant growth and this year has seen us having to cope with more than normal due to the head start that the flora had due to the Foot & Mouth restrictions. With the forth coming Village Fete, the August workparty concentrated on the Canalside Park and the Millennium Walk parts of the towpath. Hopefully all you walkers found it easy going and not too overgrown. That leads me nicely onto an invitation to those who do walk the towpaths. Please feel free to assist us and when possible carry a pair of cutters with you and snip off any straggling bramble runners. These can be a nuisance to walkers especially if they are at eye-level.
Again I have some more incidents of vandalism to report. Our narrow trailer, built especially to go behind the mini tractor down the towpaths, was taken and deposited in the pond by some kindly people with no thought to the damage it caused both to the trailer and the environment. To prevent this happening again we locked and chained the trailer up, only to come back a few days later to find the lock smashed off! It is very disheartening for our group to suffer such wanton vandalism.
The Branch has again volunteered to host the aprés-Fete BBQ and Firework display. This is becoming an annual event and gives everyone a chance to meet Branch members and also enjoy an early evening bit of fun. By the time this reaches print the Shrivenham Fete will have come and gone but I hope the weather held and everyone enjoyed themselves.
For more information or to volunteer assistance please come along to one of our meetings held in the Shrivenham Bowls Club, Martens Road, on the second Wednesday of every month at 8 p.m. You will be made very welcome. Alternatively, ask any of the volunteers that you see working on the canal or park, they will be more than pleased to stop and talk!
Orph Mable - Branch Project Co-ordinator
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