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Scaynes Hill Village
That doesn’t sound like a real crowd puller, does it? However, Scaynes Hillians bucked the trend and made an impressive turn out for the litter picking morning organised by the Sustainability Group on Saturday 16th March.
Litter picking on a wet Saturday
16 March Posted by Graeme de Lande Long
Despite rain and strong winds about two dozen people, including five intrepid children turned up in their wet weather gear at the car park at the north end of the common, were issued with litter picking sticks and bright blue plastic bags and sent off to find what they could around the highways and byeways of Scaynes Hill.
The results were outstanding as each party of sodden and cold folk returned with sackfuls of litter ranging from sweetie papers, cans, bottles, cigarette packets and even a coat! If there had been an award for the most collected it would have been a tie between Dianne & Stephen Elliott in one party (in Costells Wood) and Cilla de Lande Long and Sue Minter in another (around Anchor Pond) as they all returned with bulging and very heavy sacks. Almost everyone said that the worst culprit was dog mess, much of which people had bagged but then thrown the bags into the hedge! Many dog owners are very responsible but to those who don't bag and bin it please dispose of bags in the correct bins, or if these are full take it home and put it in your landfill bin.
With such a good turn out three of the organisers moved onto 'Plan B' and whiled away the time digging up the invasive gorse that has started encroaching on the common from the north. Various tools and techniques were tried but Clive Welland wielding his mattock definitely had the edge over the common garden spade. However, Chris Holden's spade action was rather more elegant!
Of course what the volunteers really came for was the bribe of hot dogs, home made soup and cakes laid on in the Church Annexe afterwards to warm everyone up and reward them for their sterling efforts. Huge thanks go to Kerry and Mark Jones who made a delicious leek and potato soup and organised the food, with cakes being provided by other members of the group. Hot dogs were definitely the food of choice of the younger members, one of whom(who shall remain nameless) managed three!
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Many thanks go to all those who turned out to make the event such a great success, and Scaynes Hill a cleaner place, to Chris Holden who made all the arrangements with MSDC for use of their equipment and who organised the posters, to LRPC who provided the funds for the refreshments and to the Church for kindly allowing us to use their Annexe for the after party. Who knows we may be back next year!
Council’s green wheelie bin more than half full
Mattock versus Spade
Kerry & Mark in action
