After a few days of sunshine during the week it was cooler and overcast on the Ham Lands Saturday morning as 4 of GG Richmond's finest gathered for our monthly habitat preservation work.

This month, we were tasked with tackling an area of brambles. We did this with loppers and rakes, occasionally yelping when attacked by one of the thorny tendrils.

The job was going well and we built up a few large piles of the brambles we had removed, before realising that we did not have the large canvas sacks with us to transport the brambles away from the clearing to the undergrowth.

We overcame the issue with a series of trips carrying brambles by garden fork, rake or in armfuls and soon got the job done.

Time for a quick cup of tea and group photo and we were off to enjoy our weekends!

It has been a while since we headed to St Christopher's in East Twickenham, but we know the place well! Their amazing huge garden and front drive look very grand but need frequent maintenance to prevent weeds and plants taking over, making it look unkempt and making stairs and patios risky to walk on. Between the lot of us we swept up, scrapped moss, cut back bushes, weeded and put the waste in the compost for a good hour. There is always more to do there but it does feel satisfying to see things tidied up.

The task owner was very grateful for our efforts and we felt pretty good about them too!

A beautiful end of January task today for six happy GoodGymmers to head to Star & Garter Hill where rubbish has sadly collected in the roadside undergrowth.

Between us we collected eight bags of wrappers, pill packets, food containers, bottles, even a sandal!

Bags tied up, we headed to lovely HollyHock Cafe to start the weekend with a chat and a smile.

A very pleasant Saturday morning saw 6 GGers make their way to the Ham Lands for our monthly mission helping to preserve the natural habitat for all the good plant life and beasties that live there.

We were back in the same spot as last month, working to clear the undergrowth and overgrown areas and tackling the many troublesome roots which were riddled through the soil.

We set to work with choppers and loppers and picks and mattocks. The sun started to shine and we were visited by some very friendly dogs, including Pickle who won everyone’s hearts as she wanted to play ball with us all.

After some hard, satisfying work we finally downed tools and went for a coffee (and some treats) at the Swiss Bakery 🙂

Next time at the Ham Lands will be Saturday 8th November: sign up here https://www.goodgym.org/v3/sessions/helping-the-happy-ham-landers-5177c674-7330-4205-9be1-1294fa928609