Last weekend we returned to Harlaw in the Pentlands to work on the walls there, once again aided by the Friends of the Pentlands. There were two sections needing attention, both of which had been deliberately pushed down - the first by vandals, and the second by a concerned Friend who realised that the wall was in danger of collapse. Saturday morning was bright and fair - almost too hot in the sun - and we had enough people (five of us and five Friends) to make a start on both sections. I failed to get a 'before' photo of the vandalised section, but here's how the other one looked before we started.

Note the big chunk of mortared-together copes on the middle of the heap of collapsed wall - this is part of the problem here, where the wall below the copes settles and comes away because the copes (being mortared together) can't settle with it. This isn't helped by the stone being traced (so, with the long dimension running along the wall rather than in to it) and the wall being largely hollow. Pretty much all of the wall along this side of the loch is leaning precariously and in danger of collapse.

Mid morning Sam took a wander along to the vandalised section to see how the other team were getting on, and like us they'd had to take down more of the wall than had originally been damaged but had made good progress and were beginning to build the wall back up again.

Another couple of DSWA members joined us later in the morning, having got confused about where we were working and gone to Threepmuir, but had spotted our hi-viz vests and so had managed to find us. By lunchtime we'd got the collapsed section rebuilt up to sub-cope height, but we hadn't joined it on to the existing wall due to the poor state it was in and how far it was leaning over.

Team vandalised had been getting on well also, and were over half way back up.

After lunch it didn't take long to cope the section we'd done, so we decided to take down the next bit and rebuild that also.

Still, many hands make light work, and with eight of us working on it by the end of the day we'd got most of it back up to through height.

Team vandalism had also got lots done, and had only had to leave a short section when they ran out of stone.

We bumped into one of the rangers on our way out, and she said she'd get the next day's ranger to meet us first thing so we could go and collect more stone.

The next day wasn't so bright and sunny, but a couple of us plus four Friends of the Pentlands braved the rain to head out and complete the work. Our ranger had proved better than her word and had already got a truck load of stone delivered to the vandalised site, and it didn't take us long to get it done.

We wheelbarrowed some of the stone round to the other site and were planning to return for the rest, but we bumped into the duty ranger and he agreed to bring it round for us in his truck - which proved just as well as my garden-strength barrow had proved not up to the job, and wouldn't've survived another run. The ranger very kindly also agreed to take a few of us up to the place where we were getting the stone from to get some more, and in the end did two more runs which gave us plenty to be getting on with, and by late morning we'd got the section we'd taken down the day before back up.

This left the small gap at the other end of the repair we'd done on Saturday. The problem with this was that the existing wall was leaning very precariously, which was both unsafe and also difficult (almost impossible) to build up to.

So we gave it a shove, and down it came.

The rain had gone off a bit by this time, but as soon as it stopped the midges came out in force. There was a bit of a breeze down by the loch which kept them away, so we had our lunch there. After lunch we dug out the new gap to foundation level:​

and built it back up properly.

We were a bit surprised that we'd managed to get it completed, especially after so much had come down at the last shove: having chunky stone feels like hard work at the time, but it does get the wall back up quickly, so that had helped. We'll hopefully be back in the vicinity soon to finish off the wall at Threepmuir.

Thanks to everyone who came along to help out, and to Sam for photos.

This weekend six of us went to Bankrugg near Gifford in East Lothian to do some repairs to a wall which had been breached to allow access to the property some time before. The breach had been made by someone without any experience of dry stone walling, and the ends hadn't been rebuilt as proper cheek ends, and were in danger of collapse.

There was a tree right next to the wall as well, which had destabilised it further. It hadn't helped that at some point some of the copes had been mortared on as well.

We were able to clear out most of the plants next to the wall, but the tree was too big (and the owner didn't want it cut down anyway) so we just had to build around it, and bridge over the roots in the hope that this would at least give it some room to grow, though eventually the wall will need rebuilt (or perhaps removed altogether) at this point.

Fortunately there was plenty of stone as a section further along had also been taken down to allow access, including some decent long stone suitable for cheek ends.

By the end of Saturday we'd got one of the cheek ends fully rebuilt and the other up to sub-cope level, with just a couple of courses and the copes needing put on the rest of the wall.

On Sunday only two of us were able to return, but as we'd had such a productive day on Saturday they were able to complete the wall. The cheek ends had got too high, so they lowered these also.

Thanks to everyone who came along to help, to our host Aileen for looking after us so well, to Doug and Sam for the photos, and to Ardy for modelling the wall so nicely.

On Saturday the 15th of August we went to the Peebles Agricultural Show to provide our usual demonstration of dry stone walling. As ever, they'd given us a big pile of greywacke to play with - even bigger than usual this time, which may be because they've asked us to make a couple of stone pillars for them at a new pedestrian entrance at some future date. We'd arranged with the show organiser that he'd pop by to discuss what we could do at some point during the day.

We set up our table in front of the stone pile with our books and leaflets and our table-top mini walling set.

And set about building a wall.

We had a really busy day with lots of people stopping to talk about all things wall or have a go with the mini walling kit. We had a clear winner, who managed six course wall.

In the end the show organiser didn't show up - I phoned and left a message for him, but he didn't get back to me. Perhaps not too surprising as he's probably the busiest guy in Peebles on show day. Hopefully he'll get back in touch at some point.

Thanks to everyone who came along to help out, and to Sam for photos as ever.

Last Friday and Saturday we were back at Threepmuir for another walling workshop with Youth Vision. On the way there Sam and I popped in to the Ravelrig Riding for the Disabled stables nearby. They've just acquired a field with a big dry stone wall in it, the rebuilding of which will hopefully feature in future blogs. There's quite a bit of it, in various states of repair ...

We got to the car park for Threepmuir a bit early, so while I was waiting for the Youth Vision people to arrive I had a look at the walls. There was one place where the copes were starting to come off ...

So I put them back on again.

Stitch in time, and all that ... there are plenty of other bits around the car park needing attention, but the Youth Vision people showed up just as I was getting the last couple of copes above on so they'll need to wait for another day.

​Friday's workshop wasn't so well attended as the previous ones - we only had one workshopee (if that's a word) and three DSWA volunteers; however, four of the Youth Vision people came and helped out too, so we felt we had enough to tackle the next-biggest section of collapsed wall.

When we got the wall stripped down it was obvious what the main problem was - the roots of the nearby trees had moved the foundations of the wall considerably, and most of the base stones were no longer anything like level. We needed a big pinch bar to get the biggest of them out.

Once we'd got it all dug out, and had been reinvigorated by crumpets with Youth Vision's own elder berry jam and Tim's excellent coffee, we started putting the foundations back in.

The bits of wall either side of where we were working were in a pretty bad way - one end in particular was about a foot off the original line (though still staying up due to the masses of mortar that had been put in), so we decided to just build our own section, and tie it in to the existing wall if we had time the next day. By lunchtime (delicious soup, made using coriander which was grown a few yards from where we were eating it) we'd got the first couple of courses up.

And by the end of the day we'd got the throughs on.

The next day my car got a flat tyre (fortunately only a few hundred yards or so from the house, and even more fortunately close to the garage where I go to get my car fixed, though they aren't open on Saturdays). This meant taking public transport to the southern edge of Edinburgh and hiking up to the site, so a one-hour drive became a three-hour bus/walk, and it was lunchtime before we arrived. There were three other DSWA people there though, plus a couple from Youth Vision, and they'd got our bit of wall from the day before up to sub-cope height, and were working on joining it on to the rest of the wall. Sadly, this meant more digging out of root-toppled foundations.

Of course, as is the way of this wall, once we started taking down the bits at the end more came down, which wasn't helped by a yard-long section of copes which were mortared solidly to each other and the stones beneath. Once we'd got this down the gap looked considerably bigger than it had when we'd started, and it was getting obvious that we would have neither enough time nor enough stone to finish the job that day.

We did as much as we could, and Youth Vision will talk to the park rangers to get some more stone delivered, and then we can arrange another visit to get the work finished.

Thanks to everyone who came along to help out and to Youth Vision for their ever-excellent hospitality, and to Sam for photos.

Last weekend we returned to Wooplaw. As I mentioned before, there's plenty there to keep us busy, so when nine of us turned up on Saturday five of us set to work on a dry stone seat, while the other four went to work on a new cheek end where the end of a wall had been demolished to improve access to the roundhouse area.

The seat was one a few they would like built along the top edge of  the valley just beyond the roundhouse. This is where the path between their two properties runs, along a line of old beach trees - there's been a wall along here in the past which has now collapsed, meaning there's plenty of stone. We'd previously propped up a flat stone next to one of the trees when discussing where to put a seat, so that seemed like a good place to start.

Some of the seat team set to work digging out the loose earth and stones while the rest went in search of large stones to build the base with, and especially flat ones for the seat area.

Meanwhile the cheek-end team went off back past the roundhouse to where the wall had been shortened. Some of the stone had been left beside the wall, though it looked like a lot of it had either been moved along to the roundhouse or used to shore up the path which runs along beside the river at this point.

We found a good big cheek end base stone further up the hill (near where we were working a month ago). It was too heavy to lift but fortunately easy enough to roll it down the hill, and by lunchtime we'd made a decent start (having salvaged some stones from the river which were too good to be used as banking support).

The seat team had just about finished the base, with only the flat stones needing laid on top.

Wooplaw is blessed with a lot of large flat stone - good for both cheek ends and seats - so once we got back to work it didn't take long to complete the cheek end.

Some of the seat team had to leave a bit early, so we joined them and by the end of the day this was complete also.

On Sunday there were only six of us, four from the day before (including three who'd spent the night camping at the site). We decided to make another seat a bit further along from the first one, and to make it a bit different we picked a larger space and decided to dig the seat more in to the bank, and try and make it look like it was emerging from the stones already there.

By lunchtime we'd got the seat area done, and had started on the back, which we were going to build right back in to the bank.

We sat on the first seat to eat our lunch ... useful things, dry stone seats. After lunch we finished off the 'proper' bit of the back, and then piled large stones on the top to join it back into the remains of the old wall at the top of the bank.

We've not got any more visits to Wooplaw planned for this year, but we'll be back in 2027.

Thanks to Derek and Sam for photos.

There were about 20 people there on the Saturday, which was actually a few too many for even a big project like this.

So a small team split off and went to repair a nearby cheek end which needed rebuilding.

And I, who still had my bad back, did my bit and went off to have a look around the castle (well, we all have to help however we can in circumstances like this). It's on an island in the River Dee, and you have to take a boat over to it.

We didn't stay too long though, as we'd been told there was soup, coffee and cake for elevenses. The wallers were getting on well, both at the seat and the cheek end.

Suitable refreshed we (well, they) set back to work, and both sites had progressed by lunchtime.

Linda from the South West branch had not only made the delicious soup and cakes, but also provided wraps for lunch, plus more cake. The weather brightened up a bit in the afternoon, though there were still threatening looking clouds.

By the end of the day the cheek-enders had finished their bit.

The seat wallers had got a lot done as well, but there was still work remaining for the Sunday.

I wasn't able to go back the next day, but hopefully someone will have taken some photos - I'll post them here as soon as I have them.

Thanks to Sam again for some of the photos.

​And here, thanks to Richard, is a photo of the finished wall on the Sunday. They did another cheek end on Sunday as well, but I'm not sure I'll be able to get a photo of that - if I do, I'll add it here.

A couple of weekends ago (while some of us were at South Mains - see previous post) we returned to Wooplaw to finish the work on the roundhouse which we'd started earlier in the month. Most of the existing structure was fine, but there was a cheek end which needed making more vertical, and one point where the wall had got too thin and needed rebuilding a bit wider. On Saturday we had five members (assisted by Karen from Wooplaw with cake) and between them they managed to get all but the top few courses in a couple of places finished.

On Sunday there were only a three of us, and I'd hurt my back the day before so I couldn't do much, but with most of the work already done by lunchtime it was complete.

After lunch we took a tour around the site to look at other places which could do with some work. There are plenty of these at Wooplaw, so we'll be kept busy here for quite a while.

Thanks to Sam for the photos.

Earlier this month we went to South Mains Farm, just south of Forfar, to do some work on the walls there and to hold a beginners' training course, once again in the very capable hands of Jim Grant.
Our hosts, Daan and Kirsty, had cleared away the undergrowth and put tarpaulins down for us. There were only three members on the Saturday, so we tackled a small gap while the trainees rebuilt a longer section.

Saturday was near-perfect walling weather - sunny but not too hot and with enough of a breeze to keep the insects away. Daan and Kirsty provided us with delicious home made soup and cakes (and their own home-grown apple juice), and sustained by this the trainees made a good job of getting their section up past through height.

However, there were a few issues with the other bit of the wall. The ground level behind it was now quite a bit higher than in front, though it didn't look like that had always been the case, and it looked like the build up of material behind the wall had pushed it forward a bit, causing it to tilt somewhat. We'd had to take our little section almost down to ground level to sort this out and also dismantle quite a bit more at each side.

On Sunday we only had one volunteer to tackle what was now quite a big job, but the trainees got their section finished before the end of the day ...

... so they very kindly came and helped finish off the other bit as well.

Thanks to Daan and Kirsty for hosting a great weekend, and to Sam and Doug for photos.

Earlier in the year we heard that the dry stone roundhouse at Wooplaw Community Woodland had been burnt down. This had been built back in 1992 or thereabouts with help from the Scottish Woodlands Trust, and it originally had a thatched roof. I don't think the DSWA was involved with the original project, but they must have had at least one experienced dyker working on it as the walls were properly built with well structured cheek ends on either side of the entrance, and it wasn't surprising that it had stood for over 30 years until it got vandalised.

When we got there last weekend it was dry with some sunshine, and enough of a breeze to keep the midges at bay. The Wooplaw folks had already removed the burnt timbers, and most of the stone was still in place with only one bit of wall badly collapsed. As this was in a better place for the entrance this seemed like a good opportunity to move it.

We found one inhabitant who had decided to stay on despite the fire ...

And also an old Irn Bru bottle embedded in the wall.

It contained some coins and a receipt from the Galashiels Co-op for 20 Embassy cigarettes. Sadly, the water had got in so the date (and the price of 20 fags 30+ years ago) wasn't legible. The coins had been bent to get them into the bottle, so the dates on them weren't readable either.

The stone at Wooplaw is hard greywacke. It tends to be irregular in shape, and it doesn't take well to being hammered - you're more likely to end up with a split right down the middle if you try anything more than minimal shaping. There were some good long pieces, though, which is what you need for cheek ends.

We had a pretty good turnout on the Saturday (nine DSWA members plus a couple of people from Wooplaw), which was too many to work on the roundhouse, but there are lots of walls at Wooplaw so we weren't short of things to do. The woodsmen had found it necessary to knock down a bit of the wall beside the path down to the roundhouse to get their mini tractor in, and they wanted to keep this gap and open up another one opposite to allow for a new circular walk taking in part of the wood which wasn't getting used. They'd marked the route for us in orange paint ...

Sorting this out meant four more cheek ends, so it was good that we had lots of long stone. We had lots of stone generally, in fact, as there was not only the contents of the now demolished sections of wall but there also turned out to be an old stone dump right next to the first cheek end we did (there are several of these dotted about Wooplaw).

There was an ash tree suffering from die-back next to where the last of the cheek ends needed to go which had to come down. It would've been difficult for the tree fellers to work around a newly built wall, and as it was getting late anyway we just cleared away some space around it for them to do their work later that evening.

Meanwhile down at the roundhouse the new doorway was taking shape nicely.

The next day was wetter but still with enough wind to keep the midges away. We were pleased to see that they'd managed to take the tree down without taking any of the wall with it.

I think our cheek ends steadily improved over the weekend, though they all felt pretty solid.

We didn't have so many people on the Sunday (five of the DSWA from the day before plus one new member, plus the two Wooplaw volunteers again) so once we'd done the last of the path cheek ends we all went down to work on the roundhouse. We decided to build a small seat into the inside of the wall where the original entrance had been, so we took down the original cheek ends to allow this to be built properly into the wall.

I didn't have a business card to add to the Irn Bru bottle, but we used a ticket from last week's show (with the show date printed on it) with a note on the back saying "Rebuilt by Wooplaw Community Woodland and East of Scotland DSWA" and the date. The most recent coin we could muster was a 2015 5p piece, so (after a bit of bending) that went in as well.

We built the bottle back into the wall beside the new seat.

We were running a bit sort of stone by the afternoon, so one of the Wooplaw volunteers came with the mini tractor and moved some of the spare stone from the path down for us, and by the end of the day we'd got most of the wall built up.

We'll be back in a couple of weeks to finish off the roundhouse and tackle some of the other projects they have - there's a badger hide which needs some attention, I'm told ...

Thanks to Sam and John for photos, and to Wooplaw for having us, and of course especially to all the volunteers who came along to help out.

Last Saturday we had our annual outing to the Haddington Agricultural Show. It was warm and sunny, but (as has been the case in the past) pretty windy on the exposed East Fortune site. As usual they'd provided us with a trailer load of the local red sandstone to play with, and we'd agreed that they could just leave this on the trailer for us to take as we needed. All well and good - until we tried to get the side down to unload the stone, and found that it was parked just very slightly too close to the tent. After trying to squeeze the side down (no chance) and move the tent pole (absolutely no chance) we finally managed to roll the trailer forward a few inches, and got one of the side flaps down which, once we'd removed the sides of the tent as well, worked perfectly.

They'd set up a couple of tables for us inside the tent as well, where we laid out our books and leaflets and our table-top mini walling set. The wind was blowing directly in through the opening, however, so we had to weigh everything down with hearting (and even so were sent scurrying after things following some particularly strong gusts).

We only really had enough stone to build a couple of meters of wall, and we decided only to take it up to through level for the most part, so we could show people how the wall was put together.

The mini walling kit proved popular again ...

... but not as popular as 'helping' us to build the 'big' wall. We had numerous small helpers, some of whom had remembered us from previous years. It seems we've become something of a show highlight for some budding young wallers, who were very enthusiastic about helping us complete the half-done section - some even willing to forgo watching the BMX stunt bikes in favour of doing some dyking.

I tried to tidy it up as they went along so it didn't present too much of a health hazard ...

As ever we had more people than I could count telling us how much they liked dry stone walls, along with quite a few "it's a dying art" and "how much per meter?" (check for walling bingo). And we must have done a decent job this year as I only had one old farmer asking if I wanted him to show me how it should be done (fair play to him - he'd quite correctly spotted a running joint near the top left). By about 4:30 pm it was quietening down, so we dismantled the wall and put the stone back on the trailer to go back to the farm again, ready for next year.

Thanks to John, James and Sam for coming along to help out, and to Sam for most of the photos, and a massive thank-you to the Haddington Show people for having us once again.