The plan for Thursday, 18/7/2024 is to do a maintenance weed in FP-14. This is a Council zone but we undertook to maintain the new plants there that were planted in our National Tree Day event in July, last year.

Much of the park seems to be sprouting a bright green fuzz of Chickweed and Fumitory – and FP-14 is no exception. However, one problem is that the Fumitory is already beginning to flower in FP14…

Last Week

Despite several people having to leave early for a variety of reasons, a lot of work was done with achievements including planting in the area we “sheet-mulched” last year (south east quadrant) and preparation of the north-east quadrant for the same treatment in a few weeks. In addition, the western side of the patch is now looking quite good with a little leaf litter added as well.

Conditions (last updated 06:15 18/7/2024)

Weather

General: Partly cloudy with the possibility of rain.

Rain: There’s a 40% chance of rain on Thursday (18/7) morning dropping to 20% later.
Storms/Weather warnings: Nothing that affects us.
Temperature: It should be a quite cool 7-9 degrees while we work (with “feels like” 3 degrees lower).

Wind: low strength WSW winds.
UV: rising to 1 if the sun gets through the cloud.
EPA Air Quality: Good.

Risks to highlight

• Please bring water to maintain your hydration.
• Wear appropriate clothes for the conditions – a hat, long sleeves and closed-toe shoes. Warm and wet weather gear should be considered.
• The area is quite saturated in patches. Move slowly and carefully there to avoid slips and falls.
• It’s still cold and staying dry helps staying warm.  Here are some suggestions:
  • Hands:  We do have multi-use nitrile gloves which you can wear under work gloves to keep hands dry.  Size L only though…
  • Feet/legs:  Consider waterproof pants.
• Please also consider wearing the following cold-weather gear:  
  • thermals, beanies, warm jumper/jacket, thick (or two pairs of) socks.
• Keep moving:
  • It’s a lot easier to warm up on the colder days than cool down on the hotter ones – so that’s in our favour.
  • Hand weeding in the one spot for an hour is likely not ideal when the temperatures are very low – but OK later.  Best thing is to mix things around as much as you can – especially earlier on.
• Hi-vis clothes/vests are recommended – particularly when working around the Garie Street car-park entrance.
• There are stumps, branches, lumps and bumps that may present trip hazards and eye-hazards under twiggy shrubs etc. We have some safety glasses in the PPE bag if you feel you need them.
• COVID, flu and RSV are still around again in a fairly big way it seems.  Please don’t come if you have any symptoms.
• Bull-ant bites have not been recorded – but please be vigilant…