Another mixed bag of weather

Just to contradict what I said last week about spring being on its way, we have had a few days of wintry weather this week with some knee-deep snow and ice in places on the high fells.  It didn’t stop a group of Trust staff and volunteers who completed fencing a new-laid hedge to keep out stock until the hedge has regenerated.  A good job done there.

Fencing the newly laid hedge until it regenerates.



The weather was kinder for a day of working with another ranger Mark and the school in Lorton.  I have worked with Borrowdale, Threlkeld and Braithwaite schools but this was a first time working with Mark and Lorton School.  It’s always good to learn from others who might do things differently.  In the morning we helped the children put up bird boxes and in the afternoon we had a range of activities to learn about animal and bird habitats.  It was great to see children having fun out in the sunshine but still learning.

School holidays are upon us and from now we will see increasing numbers of visitors.  This year they will find some colourful new information boards that Joe (of the Trust’s Estates Team) and I have been installing in the car parks.  We also spent time building a raft for the Foreshore Project’s fireworks that took place on Sunday at the end of a lantern parade.  Hope everyone enjoyed that.

Lntern parade ready to leave market square.

In between all that, I had two rescue call-outs.  One was for a sheep – they have a knack of jumping down a crag but can’t jump back up so we rope down, grab them, put them in slings and then rope on down.  The second was for walkers who had fallen a short distance in the wintry conditions on Sharp Edge, Blencathra – one of our black-spots.  No-one was injured so we were able to escort them off along ropes we had fixed.  It could have been a much worse outcome if they had tried unsuccessfully to extricate themselves.