Chestnuts Farm

In the week started 1 June 2021, we deployed a team under the leadership of Joe Gwamanda to work on the uMngeni River. Joe and his team are clearing both banks of the river from the Dargle Falls to the top boundary of Chestnuts Farm, a distance nearing 4 km.

The task involves felling and dragging out of the river, all alien invasive trees (Gums, Wattles, and Bugweed) of a size that can be dragged out by hand. Bigger ones will either be ring barked, or we will take up the offer of various landowners to pull them out with a tractor, in which case we will fell them.

The work involves wet feet, and we applaud Joe’s committed team, who were wading in a swollen river the day after it snowed, to pull out branches!

Wattles are consumers of large amounts of water, even more so when they grow directly on the river bank. It is territory that they favour, and the regrowth on the banks is considerable in places. This stretch was previously attended to by “Working for water”, but their modus operandi involves leaving trees in the river, and the river is still clogged with these logs many years later. Our work is slower and more expensive, but all logs are removed.

The funding for this project comes from previous fundraising efforts conducted by us together with DUCT.

We are thankful to the Addison, Griffin, Owen and Roche families for access to their properties and willingness to work alongside us and keep things tidy in years to come.