Monthly meeting

As the first meeting of the year was billed as a work party there was a very low turnout, the more so because Jenny had car trouble and Rob was out somewhere trying out his new camper.

We discussed the issues I have highlighted in the previous posting at length and the main decision taken was that we will replace some of the picnic tables provided they will be concreted in. All the other things that need fixing or painting were noted but remain firmly in the camp of the usual few.

I also ranted about the state of the arboretum so after the meeting all seven of us went there and pulled weeds, made dams around the new trees and Neil cut down some more burnt trees. At teatime we had made good progress even though there is still a lot for the Wednesday workers left to do.

After the usual coffee and delicious cake we were all prepared to stay on a while longer and tackle some of the outstanding jobs in the nursery, the main ones being the re-bagging of the Strelizia nicolai and the weeding of the trees in the shade house.

Again, a fair amount of work was done just to make it clear that without a few extra willing workers we do not have a hope to stay on top of everything the Friends are tackling especially because we are volunteers who are supposed to do this for fun.

Some fun was had though later in the day when Keith and Cathy had a braai and we had our lunch at Rob’s Roost followed by a short walk where we spotted this little feller.

The Tilapia dam’s level is getting alarmingly low just when we have spotted quite a few fingerlings. The float just doesn’t seem to cope with the hot weather and very little rain so for a few days we let the water run in straight from the pipe from the “lui dam” just to keep the level at an acceptable level.