The dry stone wall in the orchard is all but finished and with the fine weather I have been looking out for a spot to work in out of the sun. The dry stone that runs along the edge of Hagg Wood is a perfect spot. It is also the other end of the property from where the builders are working. So it is pretty quiet and dust free.
I had forgotten how much quicker it is to repair rather than rebuild a dry stone wall. It only took me a couple of hours to get this 7m section of wall back into decent shape. The trick here is not to let the wall deteriorate to a point where it has to be rebuilt.
Most of the stone had simply fallen off the wall, so it was just lurking in the long grass and nettles. I did have to use a little bit of extra stone, but stone is not something that we are short of at the moment! You can see it in the photos as the slightly lighter colour due to the amount of dust clinging to the stone. It will soon blend in.
Before the repair
And after the repair….
Not exactly perfect, but better than it was. After all, dry stone walling is an abudance of imperfections.