BTCV Edinburgh Diary

Hi there! This is Leticia, and because today is my last day with BTCV I'll write this post to tell you what we did last week.
On tuesday we went to the Hermitage of Braid. Our job there was cut down the big branches of the trees that are next to the road, because some of them were touching the top of the vehicles. We met there a lot of kids, in an school trip. They were having fun, as we did, and hopefully the weather wasn't to bad, just a soft rain during about half an hour, but that was nothing now that I know the Scottish weather, the one that you are so proud of.
On wednesday we worked with the rangers again, but this time we went to Cramond beach. It's there a beautiful sp. of rose, wich is not autochthonous, and because it's invasive the other plants can't grow up next to it. So we had to remove this rose from the beach. It seemed to be easy, but we didn't realise that it was a hard work, until we started to pull out the plants, and discovered the long roots that they had under the sand. Some of theme were longer than 3m, or 10 feet sorry, hahaha! The weather was windy but nice, and at lunch time we went to the island. Fraser tried to have his bath but it wasn't enough water for him. Next time!
On thursday we went back to Pentlands, to the car park were we had been the week before. This time we coulndn't start a fire, so we lift all the branches in packets for the next time. It was more luck for the drain that now is unblocked. It was Kenny's birthday, and he brougth a very nice muffins for all of us, uummmm!
Now is time for me to say good bye. I'm willing to go back home, because I miss my family and friends, but I know I'll miss you. It's been very nice to meet you and work with you. I think you are doing a great job and I hope we'll keep in touch.
Thanks for everything, a big hug and a lot of kisses for all of you!
Leticia.

Posted by Anonymous at 13:20 0 comments  

Labels: Cramond, Hermitage of Braid, Pentlands

It may sound glamorous, but lifting crowns has nothing to do with royalty. We spent the last week removing the lower branches on trees in various parts of Edinburgh.

Lots of trees were planted for the millennium, and they are now big enough to need a bit of attention. Unfortunately it's difficult to get between them, so we have been learning how to cut lower branches off trees with minimal impact on the trees, and helping to clear out the undergrowth between them.

On Tuesday we were up on the Pentlands, in a car park miles from anywhere. On the way we got caught behind a herd of cows being moved to a new field a few kilometres down the road. It really made a mess of our nice clean van... As the car park is so isolated people seem to like dumping things there, so we cut back the vegetation to make it visible from the road and hopefully discourage them. It rained quite heavily in the morning, so we had a bit of trouble starting a fire to burn the branches, but we persisted and had roaring flames by the early afternoon so we could sit and appreciate our hard work. We'll be going back there in a couple of weeks to finish trimming and unblock a drain.

On Wednesday we were out at the Hermitage of Braid doing a similar task to make a bridge clearer, and on Thursday we were at a school in Duddingston helping with their trees. It's amazing how much you can get cleared with so many people, and last week our minibus was overflowing. We had to ask several people to make their own ways to the sites, as the good weather seems to have brought more people out with us.

Sadly this is Leticia's last week with us as she is going back to Spain next week. It's been wonderful working with her, and I hope she enjoyed her time here. We will have a new Spanish VO, Fatima, starting with us in two weeks time.

Posted by Gemma at 11:06 0 comments  

Labels: Duddingston, Hermitage of Braid, Pentlands

Congratulations to all those who helped with Gardening Scotland 2008. Our jigsaw garden gained a Silver-Gilt Award, that's only one off a Gold. Pictures of the garden are on our photo site. Thank you for all your hard work.

Posted by BTCV Edinburgh at 19:46 0 comments  

Labels: Admin, Gardening Scotland

I’ve just had a very enjoyable and productive 2 week period out at Oatridge and then at Ingliston preparing for the Garden show….. a lot of tricky wood-work that for a long time resembled boxes with lavvy seats attached all around them…. Then it all came together for the exhibit, and a grand exhibit it was….. something to be proud of………once we rubbed out the pencil marks etc.

Looking around the rest of the show earlier today……(it starts tomorrow)…….there are vast numbers of exhibits there now in all different styles…….the Jacussi exhibits, the Dry Stone Walling Association’s fine collection of arches, Jupiter’s jig-saw…. But what I was struck by was the huge influence that TV garden “makeover” shows have had on the majority of exhibits….. Exhibits that tend to look as if they’ve been constructed from a flat pack bought at IKEA with plants “slotted” into their allotted spaces or as if they’ve “popped up” in a teletubby landscape…. Many looking as if a large part of the finished product came from high energy industrial rather than human labour intensive horticultural processes…..(the sort of things the Volunteers do all the time and are so good at).

I did ask Heath at one point, “where’s the dung?”…….and wondered about the feasibility of an exhibit which could be at the same time attractive and relate to the “muck” aspect of gardening…… I often pass by various of Edinburgh’s allotments and I guess that that’s the kind of gardening approach that I tend to identify with…. And there’s still plenty of demand for allotments…………

I do recognise that the TV makeover approach has made gardening, of a kind, much more available to many more people but I wonder whether it’s an approach that’s really capable of getting people involved in the real dirty handed and sweaty processes of horticulture.

Rob Hainsworth

Posted by coalhole at 20:29 0 comments  

Labels: Gardening Scotland

I am sure that you will all wish to join me in congratulating Gemma who has gained a Ranger position in Fife! It is a fitting reward for all her hard work with us over the last 12 months.

The other good news is that as it is a part time position Gemma will be able to carry on working with us a Volunteer Officer so we can still look forward to her excellent baking!

Posted by Chris Peach at 17:44 1 comments  

Labels: Announcements

once the clouds lifted and we were let to work in some nice sunshine i took a group of four volunteers and we continued to put up the rabbit fencing of which we have about half of the whole job completed.kenny led the other half of the group and constructed one of the gates needed on the job. we enjoyed our ususll game of cards at dinner time and had a good laugh in the meantime.one of the volunteers had a slight mishap with ao ongoing problem with a lopsided bench which we aim to fix the next time were there but all in all everyone enjoyed themselves.the job itself has at most two days left untill completion.next entry to follow shortly

Posted by ronnie at 11:22 0 comments  

Labels: Jupiter

We've created a map showing the sites we work at. What's more, the sites will eventually link to their respective photo albums and blog entries! Look at Corstorphine Hill and Blackford Pond for an early taster of the future.

If you view the larger map then you will also get a list of all the sites shown on the map. You'll also notice a new link to this map on the left for easy access in the future.

Posted by BTCV Edinburgh at 13:38 0 comments  

Labels: Admin