Seven Goodgymers met with Ranger Tom at Braywick Nature Centre. Our task had changed slightly - we were asked to coppice some trees and transport the branches to an area where they will be used to build some dry hedges. The saying goes, that wood keeps you warm three times - once when you chop it, once when you split it, and again when you burn it. Well in our case it kept us warm at least three times, but for different reasons. Tom found us two stands of hazel to chop down, so we split into 2 groups and set to work. With loppers, pruning saws and bow saws we set about chopping the trunks down. This certainly kept us very warm! We trimmed off the smaller branches and made some nice long stakes. Still kept us warm! And finally we carried them over to the hedge-building area - definitely still warm! Great team work and it was lovely to meet up with everyone again

10 GoodGymmers "came together" outside the Braywick Nature Centre on a much warmer evening that we've been having of late to attempt to build stag beetle habitats. Unfortunately, upon trying to locate the equipment we realised that our task owner may have accidentally forgotten we were coming and hence had to think of a plan B(eetle). Perhaps "Yesterday" I should have sent a reminder to say "Don't let me down". Amy and I even tried calling for "Help!", but alas, in the end we just had to "Let it be".

Thankfully our glorious leader Amy had a colony of litter pickers in the boot of her car (sadly, not a VW Beetle!) so we set to work with the intention of having a social walk around the parkrun loop, a very "long and winding road", whilst clearing up any litter we saw en route.

We stag-gered around together, chatted and cleaned up a few bags of rubbish. Great job team! Hopefully we can return another evening to give the beetles a "little help from their friends" so they can "twist and shout" in their new home!

We also congratulated Tony on his 50th good deed this evening! Well done Tony!

What a wonderful morning! Sunlight glinting through the trees, fun playing with the ice on the pond, waders on, which make you feel invincible, lots of laughter, wrestling with roots, and of course buckets and buckets of mud, glorious, stinky, splattery mud!

Thanks to Ranger Tom and the parks team for welcoming me, Sheila and Tony to their work party this morning. We had a brilliant work out and helped with the final push to clear out the pond (for the first time in 40 years!) ready for it to be re-filled.

Tony, Sue and Sheila braved the coldest morning of the season so far to go and help muck out the pond at Braywick Nature Reserve. After donning waders ( all except for Sue, whose neat little size 3 feet would have been swamped in the sizes available) and long gloves, we made our way down to the pond. We had to climb over the fence as the gate padlock was frozen, and break the ice on the pond, but Tony was straight into the water in the partially-drained pond. Together with Rangers Tom and Rosie, and members of the Parks Team, we set to work digging out sludge from the edge of the pond into buckets which were then emptied out on the edge of the area. Always being mindful of not digging into the pond liner. Tom and Tony got the pump going to lower the water level and reveal more lovely sludge. We all ended up covered in mud, but had a great time helping out, and after a hose-down back at base, made our way home for a warm-up Feeling like you've missed out? More mud-moving scheduled for next week https://www.goodgym.org/happenings/help-maintain-the-pond-in-the-braywick-nature-reserve-088520ce-95d4-4ffb-aec3-600e17c6253a

Due to continued flooding at Ockwells, our group of intrepid volunteers were re-deployed to Braywick Park. It was great to be able to welcome Karin to her first ever Goodgym session, and Angela to her second. A warm welcome to you both. We armed ourselves with shovels and spades, and made our way down into the park. Our task was to clear the mud and leaf litter from the sides of the paths to make it safer for walkers, runners and cyclists. We were amazed by how wide the paths really are, and we got appreciative comments and thanks from pretty much everyone who passed by. We have released Braywick's hidden motorways! There is more that can be done, especially along the Cut to make it safer for parkrunners, but we have made a great start.

Our task at Ockwells Park could not go ahead due to extensive flooding - wetsuits would have been more appropriate than the wellies we were going to bring! Nonetheless the rangers at Braywick Nature Centre found us an alternative task at Braywick, clearing mud from the paths. The mud has been creeping onto the paths from the sides, and together with leaf mould from fallen leaves, the paths have become slippery for walkers and runners. Garry, Angela, Rosie, Rachel and Sheila went armed with spades, shoves, rakes and a wheelbarrow, and set to work. We managed to widen quite a long stretch of path, and Garry even discovered a whole section of path which had become over-run with ivy, forcing people to make a detour which had become very muddy. He also cut back the tree to allow people to use the path again - see if you can tell which section that was on your next Maidenhead park run! It was a good workout on a very chilly morning and we were all a bit warmer on our way home.