A typical day in my life at Steward Community Woodland
- by Clare -

I am usually woken early by the dawn chorus, when the woods are alive with the sound of birds, and a friendly Robin often comes into the long house looking for crumbs. By eight most of us are up, visiting the compost loo and starting the fire in the kitchen . Most mornings (except Wednesday when we have a business meeting that can last all day) we have a 'morning meeting' at which we discuss our plans for the day. We discuss what needs doing and see who wants to do what.

Today looks like it's going to be warm and sunny, the weather has been like this for several days now, so I want to go and see if anything in the growing area needs watering. Ben and several others are going to visit the re-cycling centre in Newton Abbot to see if they can find anything that we could make use of. Water tanks and pipe are required to set up a water supply to the growing area. We also need more large metal boxes which we often find at the recycling center and have found are good for storing food (because rodents can't get in).

Katrina has been doing a survey of the trees, so Pete and her are off to explore the top area of the woods. Last week I helped her survey the trees along the disused railway track, that runs along the bottom of the woods, we were both surprised and delighted at how many young oak trees there were. I head off down the hill with a bucket full of kitchen scraps for the compost bin. I pass Dan with some visitors from Buckfastleigh who have arrived while he was collecting the post.

At the growing area I empty the bucket into the compost bin and cover the kitchen scraps with grass cuttings. The growing area looks fine, only the comfrey cuttings, which are in pots, need watering. Everything is growing really well, we ate our first lettuce the other day, it tasted wonderful. The potato's are flowering, so they should be ready soon, and the nasturtiums are all flowering, nasturtium flowers and leaves are both edible, so as well as bringing some colour to the garden, they add colour and a peppery flavor to salads.

We are planning to plant a herb garden near the kitchen, so I spend the morning weeding and taking cuttings from some of our herb plants. There is little shade in the growing area and the sun is really hot, so it is a relief to walk back up to the kitchen in the shade of the trees at lunchtime. I pick some spinach and sorrel to have for lunch. On the way back up the hill I see a bird that I can't identify and try to remember to look it up in a bird book later in the day.

In the kitchen Pete is burning citrus peel. We prefer not to put citrus peel in the compost in great quantity so we burn it instead. Dried peel makes a very good fire lighter if you can keep it dry but we haven't had much success. The kettle has been recently boilded so I have a pepermint tea to perk me up a little. Somebody has already prepared some salad and raw hummous so I quickly made an additional dish with the stuff I picked in the growing area and sit down to eat.

I am still eating when the phone rings in the long house and somebody shouts that Ben has called to say that they are about to arrive back with loads of stuff from the recycling center. I quickly finish my food and join the others on the way back down to the bottom to help carry stuff up. On the way past the growing area I grab one of the wheel barrows to make it easier to take stuff up the hill.

The trip to the recycling center has been quite productive. A exercise bike for converting into a cycle powered generator has been bought along with several water tanks, a large metal cabinet, some flue pipe and another wheel barrow. They also visited the fruit and veg wholesalers and have come back with loads of grapes, apples, bananas, melons, cabbage, potatoes and courgettes. We load up the wheel barrows and stretcher and make our way slowly back up the hill. It is hard and sweaty work on this hot sunny day and it take two trips bring everything up, by the end I am really hot and fancy a swim. Other people say they also fancy a swim and before long a group of us are heading off into Moreton along the disused railway track.

It turns out that the swimming pool at Moreton is closed so we ask in the Information Center about the location of the old swimming pool and go there instead. We find that it contains very little water but that doesn't stop Ben and Pete from taking the plunge and the rest of us enjoyed the walk.

Back in the woods we find Jim has made curry and chips so we tuck in then retire to the long house leaving Dan (who didn't even eat the curry) to do all the washing up. I take the opportunity to look up the bird I saw earlier while the others discuss the diary update on the website. As it gets dark Pete brings out his guitar and sings a few songs and I settle down for a well deserved sleep.

(this was a fictional day constructed from mostly real events)