From Field To Woodland

I guess there will be many unexpected things that happen during this project. This week, during a stroll around the field with my very good friend Mongo, we found a hole! A new hole. Mongo being Mongo, wanted to investigate. Possibly this is a result of the drying of the field, we haven't had rain of significance for many weeks and there are a lot of cracks from the clay drying out. Could some underground water course have dried so much that it has caved in? We don't know. The hole is only 30-50cm deep but clearly something below that level, has dropped - and we are in mining country! A quick call to the Coal Authority to enquire as to whether I should be concerned , suggested that I should. Given the virus lockdown, they were impressively reactive. I had 4 calls from different people in the space of an afternoon, and tomorrow contractors will be arriving to fence off said hole! They don't mess about these people. I think (hope) they are just being cautio...

Today myself and version 2.0 child set out to find out the pH of the soil in our field. I am not 100% sure yet what impact the pH will have, but it felt like a good idea to at least know just in case somebody (the Woodland Trust most likely) asks the question when we are planning our planting scheme. I tried to take a measure a few weeks ago after some rain, but the soil was still just too dry. Today we went armed with lots of water and a few digging tools. In some of the spots we tested, a friendly mole had lifted the soil for us and that saved us some work. He is making a bit of a mess but I figured it likely aerates the soil and if he is there, it must be because there are worms in the soil which suggests nice healthy soil. Our results were pretty middle of the road, ever so slightly acidic with readings between 5.5 and 7.  A quick google tells me this is pretty good and that both Beech and Oak will be happy here (they will be the cornerstones of the...