Richard’s Wey March 2017

Published on: 9 Mar, 2017
Updated on: 9 Mar, 2017

The latest report from Richard Cant, the Stoke lengthman on the River Wey Navigations

I was off work for the first week of February. Now this may seem a strange way to begin my monthly diary of the work I’ve been doing, but it does give me a good opportunity to explain what happens when I require time off from my 24/7 role.

I don’t work standard office hours, but work on a rota system to provide round the clock cover for weir operations and incidents such as fallen trees or stuck boats.

This means that for me to book time off I need to do so well in advance so that the weirs are not left unattended and that there are still enough members of staff on duty to attend any emergencies.

Typically, while I was off we experienced heavy rain making river levels unstable and weir operations difficult, so thank you to everyone involved in covering me.

Even my volunteers went above and beyond the call of duty, working away without me they gap-planted a hedge and continued my routine litter picks. So again a big thank you and well done.

By the time I got back to work the river conditions had settled down so I was able to finish the last of the winter work programme.

This included removing some low hanging branches from the river and raking up the last of the leaves from Bowers lockside.

We also finished back-filling the bank repairs that we started last month to re-instate some eroded parts of towpath.

Those of you who regularly walk the towpath may have noticed that a few of the signs have gone missing along the Stoke Length. Don’t worry, they haven’t been stolen it’s just that I’ve taken them in for a repaint before the summer boating season.

Just one of the trees blocking the Wey Navigation we were called out to deal with after Storm Doris.

Just when my thoughts had started to turn to spring, light evenings, and warmer weather, Doris came knocking! Of course I mean Storm Doris, which although wasn’t very wet was very windy.

Although we carry out regular surveys of all the trees on our land, identify any potential problems and deal with them proactively, we can’t guarantee that strong winds won’t damage them and so we did still have a few to clear including over the weekend.

I suppose that just goes to show the importance of the lengths man’s call-out rota.

Richard Cant

Stoke Lengthsman

07786 703 832

richard.cant@nationaltrust.org.uk

www.facebook.com/RiverWey