Out West: Day Eight

The first of two consecutive Sunday work parties met today in Wild Lea. A neighbour, a small holder from the Barton area, then Dan, his wife and me. More were hoped for and many more will present next Sunday. Today it was agreed that anyone thinking about popping along for three hours tree work was probably dissuaded by a series of sharp showers that poured down from just before first light. I was woken by intense rain drumming on the roof of my cabin at six o’clock.

A cardinal rule here is power-tools are banned on Sundays. If any additional work is required, muscle power provides the energy. As Dan and I were to clear brambles, blackthorn and brushwood, we had to ignore the rule. Wild Lea is a long way from where people live and one of the neighbours, Bron, wanted this clearing to be carried out along her property line. Bron was one of today’s work party.

As well as clearing the fence line, we unpinned barbed wire from the fencing and pulled out the rotting wooden posts. We did this to gain access to a stream, that Nigel, The Ditch Bitch, will work on to make it a more effective drain. Wild Lea holds a lot of water, too much.

As we worked, the sky lightened and the clouds cleared. By one o’clock, when we gathered in our tools and returned them to various sheds, it was a beautiful, warm afternoon. Honey bees were out in force buzzing on the Mirabel Plum tree blossom.

On their way to a friend’s for the afternoon, Dan’s family dropped me off at Hurcott at the end of the Polden Way. I strode up Gilling Down into Great Breach Wood. The footpath affords stunning views across the Somerset, but a lot of time has to be spent stepping round, over and through difficult muddy patches. It is a very demanding route in parts, with sticky grey clay grabbing at the feet, where mud can be more than ankle deep.

The path works a way through a series of ridgeway woods. The track is normally accessed by sheep too, which breaks up the route underfoot even more. At this time of year all sheep are in lambing fields down close to the farm houses. The Polden Way, sign-posted by Large Blue butterfly symbols, (as it is only in these woods that it is found), was a beautiful route, with views out to the north coast of the county.

There was plenty of bird life about in the sunshine and I am pretty certain I saw a Chough up there. I managed to record its distinctive call on my phone and it matches the online examples well. It would be wonderful if this large corvid is extending its range from the far west again.

As I finished my walk today, I saw three, day old, wobbly-legged lambs (including a pair of twins), with their mothers, next door to Wild Lea.

Nearly every sheep you see on farms are ewes and their young. Male sheep are all slaughtered for meat, unless lucky enough to be picked out to act as rams to impregnate the flocks, Similarly, male cattle and male chickens are not kept, unless for breeding. Milk, eggs and the next generation are what we take most from farm animals, an excess of males is not economic.

Farmers know this and perhaps we know this instinctively too. Having an excess of males is problematic in many ways. I suspect patriarchy comes in part from fear of women, which is why women are controlled in so many ways in societies the world over. I’ll leave that thought with you.

The walk was really tiring, so I turned off onto the busy Reynald’s Way, then walked with sunlight on my back down into the now shopless Butleigh village. I zigged and zagged the back way, coming into the permaculture garden via Wild Lea, passing the embers of the work party fire in the women’s Hawthorn circle.

Ambling up to my cabin, I spotted one of the chickens wandering around the orchard, so ushered her home to the run, (the henitentiary). As I prepared my Feta cheese salad, I listened to the North London Derby (Spurs 1 Arsenal 4), and practiced pool, but was eventually too tired to read, falling asleep in the cabin by nine o’clock.

It was the third evening in a row that there was no need for me to light the wood-burner. Even with a clear sky at night, and no lit stove, it has been warm enough to do without pyjamas.

I have one more night in Somerset, then I will catch the train home on Tuesday evening.

~

CLP 22/02/2026