27 volunteers from CRG and Rhymney River Community spent a mostly sunny morning cleaning up Fishpond Wood, in Llanrumney.

It’s a potentially lovely area of woodland, with lots of bluebells and wood anemones just now, but it’s been blighted by a lot of domestic fly-tipping and general littering.

Together, the volunteers collected around 80 bags of assorted rubbish, plus numerous miscellaneous items, including 4 complete car wheels, 5 car tyres, 4 traffic cones, a large piece of carpet, lots of offcuts of a different carpet, remnants of a flat-pack drawer unit, most of a CRT television, a mattress and a large glass-topped patio table.

Thanks to Gareth, from the Community Park Rangers — Wild About Cardiff — who manages the woodland, and to Benjamin & Krean, from the Council’s waste management team, for collecting all the rubbish.

An amazing 60 or so volunteers from CRG, We Are Cardiff, Keep Grangetown Tidy and local residents came together this morning to clean up Hamadryad Park and Clarence Embankment.

The banks of the Taff along the park and the small “inlet” were just swamped with litter that had been washed up — a huge number of plastic drinks bottles, plus cans, crisp packets, fast food packaging, footballs, polystyrene, odd shoes, items of clothing, etc. And, of course, there was the “usual” amount of litter scattered throughout the park and along the neighbouring roads.

In just two hours, the combined volunteers collected 155 bags of rubbish, plus miscellaneous larger items, including road barriers, a bathroom sink, traffic cones, a toilet seat and a cricket helmet.

Also, the riverside footpath along Clarence Embankment was cleared of rotting leaves, left over from the autumn.

Thanks to everyone who came along and made a real difference!

We returned to Howardian Nature Reserve to continue clearing the fly-tipping from what could be a lovely stream running through the reserve.

We managed to clear another huge amount of rubbish. We will be back to remove yet more rubbish but also to remove wood and open it up to allow it to flow again.

Thanks to Jess from the Community Park Rangers Team, the Cleansing Team who collected it all and, of course, our brilliant volunteers.

We spent the morning in the meadow at the end of Harrison Drive, St Mellons, doing some path maintenance.

CRG volunteers wielded spades to remove a huge amount of grass/turf from both edges of a gravel path that had become seriously encroached on over the past few years.

You can see the difference they made from the before-and-after photo!

Together they cleared over 100m of path. There’s still more to do, so we may well be returning at some point.

The turf removed was piled up in the meadow. The heaps of turf may not be things of beauty to us, but they could prove attractive to some of the many species of bee that nest in the ground.

20 volunteers spent the morning tackling the park, woodlands, lake edge and stream at Parc Coed Y Nant, behind Pentwyn Leisure Centre.

Together they collected about 50 bags of miscellaneous litter, plus some larger items, such as broken/burned camping chairs, a couple of scooters, most of a wooden door, and a car wheel.

And Dave was delighted by the piece of lead pipe!

More photos on Flickr.

A terrific turnout this morning for our joint event with Keep Wales Tidy, despite the horrible weather. And another 20+ metres of dead hedge built along the Ely Trail at Grangemoor Park on behalf of the Community Park Rangers.

The dead hedge was built using willow that had been removed to let more light reach the rough grass alongside the path, which will give wildflowers, including orchids, more of a chance.

And another litter-pick produced yet more bags of rubbish (despite there being a bin right at the entrance to the trail).

Thanks to everyone who came along!

More photos, and a short video of the finished dead hedge, on Flickr.

At least 40 volunteers came along to Howardian Nature Reserve on a wet and windy February morning. They removed an appalling amount of fly-tipping from a watercourse that runs along the edge of the reserve, and also cleared a lot of scrap metal from an ‘encampment’ that had been made amongst the trees.

The fly-tipped rubbish included the usual domestic waste (eg, food packaging and drinks bottles & cans), plus 4 walking frames, 2 wheeled ‘tri-walkers’, a large number of toys, numerous footballs, bags of clothing, a lot of shoes (quite a few of which appeared to be new and unworn), a leather sofa, a double-bed base, numerous chairs (wooden and metal), several carpets, seemingly endless amounts of chipboard from kitchen units and flat-pack furniture (most of which was now wet and crumbling), bags of unopened canned food, polystyrene packing materials, several children’s bikes, a child’s slide, a flatscreen TV, and the inevitable traffic cone.

The most upsetting part – aside from the eyesore and pollution of a watercourse – was the fact that so many of the items could have been re-used by others.

The total haul was about 5 tipper-loads of rubbish, plus a trailer-load of scrap metal.

Many thanks to Jess and Alec from the Community Park Rangers – Wild About Cardiff – for their support, and for ferrying a lot of the rubbish using their wonderful electric buggy…

… and to enforcement staff from the council, who will be investigating the fly-tipping, to find evidence that will identify the culprits.

Lots more photos on Flickr.

CRG & St Mellons Clean Up combined forces to do a “deep clean” of Hendre Lake Park. Overall, they mustered around 33 volunteers, including some welcome new faces.

The vegetation along the paths and around the fishing pegs had been cut back recently, to reveal a lot of “embedded” rubbish — some of it had obviously been there a very long time. There was also quite a lot of fly-tipped waste, including used nappies.

The final haul was almost 90 big bags of rubbish, plus a large amount of miscellaneous items, including an upholstered foot stool (retrieved from the lake), a car wheel and a large gas cylinder.

A lot of the rubbish — especially things like broken camping chairs, plus drinks cans and food packaging in the reeds & brambles next to fishing pegs — had clearly been dumped by an irresponsible minority of anglers. It’s so sad that the actions of a thoughtless few can spoil things for everyone else, not to mention the hazards posed to wildlife.

Still, Hendre Lake Park now looks much cleaner than it did — let’s hope it stays that way for a while.

And our thanks to the Community Park Rangers for being there to supervise & support us.