Help from Newton Rigg students

Over the past four Fridays the Ullswater Ranger team have been working with seven Newton Rigg Students at Wetheral Woods.

Wetheral Woods is located in the Northern most reaches of the Central and East Lakes property portfolio. The Woods are located on the banks of the river Eden, on the outskirts of Wetheral Village.

The woods are home to many interesting features, not least St Constantine cells, that have been dug into the red sand stone cliff face, right on the side of the river. It has been said that they were refuge for the monks from the nearby priory. The woods are also home to small leaved lime trees. This is the furthest north that they are found in the UK.

Some area of the woodland have started to get a little tired over the years, not least a steep section of steps that link the top path to the lower one.

This work would be an arduous task for the small Ranger team, with some 50 steps needing to be replaced. The team jumped at the chance to have Seven young fit students from Newton Rigg to help.

Newton Rigg is and Agricultural College situated on the outskirts of Penrith. These seven students are studying a Countryside Management course and needed some work experience in countryside estate skills.

The students broke up into two groups, one group concentrating on the steps, and another focusing on re surfacing some of the boggier sections of path.

The groups swapped over each work so that they could all try their hand at each task. After a couple of weeks the students were progressing well up the steep slope.

And by the final week the huge improvements in the path were clear for all to see with many local dog walkers thanking us for the improved access.

A huge thank you has to go to the students and their tutor Pam, in helping to complete a task that would have taken the Ranger team considerably longer to complete.