About 60 children from Woodland School and many adults had some fantastic outdoor lessons at Woodheys Park, Kenmore Road, Sale, on 25th October where the Friends of Woodheys Park (FoWP) had arranged for Glen Roberts a professional “bodger” and with his apprentices’ demonstrated the ancient arts of “bodging” (making things out of freshly felled timber such as chairs, rounders batons, rolling pins etc.
Glen explained to the children about the age of trees, how to split logs accurately, use a “shave horse” to hold pieces of wood which were shaved from ‘square’ to roughly round before turning them on a mechanical pole lathe into chair legs or batons.
Frankland Tree Services demonstrated the art of wood carving with a chain saw, with a fine display of animals and mushrooms cut earlier. They also showed a few of the skills used by woodsmen often forgotten in the modern age!
Also demonstrated was a band saw that could cut cross-sections of trees – or turn them into planks of any thickness so as to make bigger furniture.
Inside the Pavilion, Trafford and District Woodcraft Club were showing how to make ‘treen’ (objects in wood), with lathes and hand carving together with a display of the amazingly tactile objects they produce.
(The woods attached to Woodheys Park have been neglected over the years and to start improving and managing them TMBC have started to cut selected trees which has provided the timber for this event.)
This event was enabled by a grant from TMBC’s “Neighbourhood Voluntary Sector Grants Scheme (South)”, who also helped arrange it.
A number of TMBC councillors also attended and were very impressed and believed that it should be repeated in the spring – and arrange for more schools to attend.