We’re incorporating some rocky habitat into a new outdoor hand washing point we’re putting in the lodge field. We’re using old metal tree guards as ‘gabions’ that we’ll fill with rocks and stone, and a recycled steel sink. Here’s Ian breaking the ground, so we can secure the gabions properly.
The hand washing station will drain into the grass, hopefully making a damp but not soggy patch that will be good for wildlife. All the nooks and crannies in the stones – when we fill up the cyclinders – should provide homes for invertebrates and perhaps some lichens or mosses too. The stones are from the farm of course. They are ones we’ve collected up over the years, for example when we put a new door into Otter Cottage.
This sink is going near the campfire site and the mown badminton area, so it should be easy to access for anyone using the field or the swings and slide area. In designing it, we’ve tried to stick to our principles of reuse and recycle, and the principle of striving to add in a benefit to biodiversity wherever possible – things we said we’d do in our Charter for 2020.
Of course, the main point is to help manage the covid 19 risk this summer. This is one of three handwashing stations going in. The others have recycled elements too. There’s a sink in an old wine barrel that has been plumbed into the barn where we keep lots of the childrens’ bikes. Another reclaimed sink has been built into a little surround on the outside of the stables opposite Balebarn Lodge.
30DaysWild Previously
This time last year: We were admiring the poppies and thinking about DDay Remembrance
This time in 2018: We’d just added the new Wheatland Farm labyrinth. It’s still going!
This time in 2017: We were helping a toad to the pond