13/12/16

James Begley, Mike Moxon, Mike Richardson, Duncan Simey

Digging bottom dig, continuing down. 

6/12/16

Estelle Sandford, James Begley, Mike Moxon
2hrs
Having confirmed dry enough to dig on Sunday, 3 of us digging in the lower dig. Few large boulders removed and digging gravelly corally spoil out now. Quite a reasonable sized hole - about a metre wide by 2 long going straight down pretty much with solid walls around it. James not feeling too good so didn't dig as long as usual. 

4/12/16

Estelle Sandford
1/2 hour
Estelle went down to check water levels. Top dig still had a little puddle in but had some subsidence on the way to the dig and tools mostly under water. Lower dig was driest and no sign of any subsidence. All good to dig on Tuesday. 

22/11/16

Estelle Sandford, James Begley, Mike Moxon, Stu Lindsay
30mins
The rains had been torrential on Monday and Kevin had observed the dig so the spoil heap was 2ft underwater, so a lot of flooding and backing up. By Tuesday the digs were still very full of water, but the main spoil heap area had drained. Suspect it will take a couple of weeks of dry weather for the digs to drain. We only went down to look and take a few photos. 

15/11/16

Estelle Sandford, James Begley, Mike Moxon, Duncan Simey, Miri Pihlaja, Jeremy Fry, Stu Lindsay
2.5hrs
No-one made last week, so clearing rubble from bottom dig - there was a lot, the bang did good! and also digging the top dig. Now needs 5 people as it's getting quite deep. Following a good solid roof and both left and right walls are solid too. Going down steadily around a metre wide and keeping good working space in height. Bottom dig cleared well and still going fairly well straight down. 

1/11/16

Estelle Sandford, James Begley, Jeremy Fry, Mike Moxon, Stu Lindsay, Mike Richardson
2.5hours
Estelle & Stu prepared the bottom dig for a bang while the others worked on the top dig. Lots more spoil removed and the bang went off well. Will be interesting to see the damage!

25/10/16

Estelle Sandford, Mike Moxon, Mike Richardson, Andrew Horeckyj, Stu Lindsay, Fran Campbell, Jeremy Fry plus James Begley arrived late.
2.5hrs
7 of us to start and then James joined at 8ish. We split into 2 groups to dig both top and bottom digs. Bottom dig was Estelle, Jeremy and Andrew mostly and was very messy still and hard work going in and out for spoil emptying with the levels of clay trying to glue you down! Both digs made good progress and the spoil heap is getting larger and larger. Good to have so many keen and enthusiastic people there digging. 

18/10/16

Estelle Sandford, Mike Moxon, Stu Lindsay, Jeremy Fry, Mike Richardson (MCG)
2.5hrs
Gained Mike R this week and we hadn't scared Jeremy off. Mike M did the guided tour of the rest of the cave for them while Stu started digging and Estelle handling the buckets back. Soon the rest arrived from exploring and we started relaying the spoil. Mike R took over for a bit and pulled out a massive boulder and then swapped out for Jeremy who dug until pub o clock. Good session, getting deeper and still easy digging in mud/rocks. 

11/10/16

Estelle Sandford, James Begley, Mike Moxon, Stu Lindsay, Jeremy Fry from Waldegrave
2.5hrs
Good digging session, lots cleared and dig getting bigger and bigger. Having met Jeremy last Friday in the Waldegrave, he experienced his first trip underground by going digging, we probably should take him caving sometime soon! He seemed to have a great time and managed to remove a pretty hefty boulder during his digging session. Mike dug first, Jeremy second and Estelle third. 

4/10/16

James Begley, Stu Lindsay, Duncan Simey

James to add detail... Estelle went to Brownsea Island instead and left the lads digging - think it was a bit too much hard work with only 3! 

27/9/16

Estelle Sandford, James Begley, Duncan Simey, Stu Lindsay, Mike Moxon
2hrs
When we arrived we decided that we'd try and move an RSJ to nearer the cave, but between 5 of us, this was still quite hard going. Kevin had provided an old trolley, which didn't look like it would take it, but was stronger than it looked. We got it across the lawn and down the slope but there is no way that will go across the field, so need to wait until Kevin is back and do it then with the digger.
Good digging session, James in first, Duncan in second and then Stu in to finish the session off. Is easy digging in mud and some water-worn rocks in the mud. The mountain of spoil heap is getting quite large now! 

6/9/16

Estelle Sandford, James Begley, Mike Moxon, Stu Lindsay
2hrs
Mike set to work in the dig first and removed the two boulders in the floor, but these were too heavy for Estelle to move, so she set to trying to break them up a bit with the hammer. Noticed that another rock in the roof looked a little loose, so Mike came out and prodded a bit and brought more ceiling down. Mike did a little more digging while Estelle passed up to James and Stu the boulders that were small enough. Mike then took to beating boulders while Estelle had a dig. Mike did some then James had a go and finished them off. Dig itself is draughting well from the right, which probably links to the dig from the higher section and is digging very interesting colours of sediment layers to the level which is very squidgy on top, so probably where the water flowed. 

23/8/16

Estelle Sandford, James Begley, Mike Moxon, Stu Lindsay, Mark Denning, Kevin Clinton
2.5hrs
Mark went in and saw all the cave and digs as he'd not been here since the big hole was dug, but the rest of us didn't really go far underground as the evening was spent putting a scaffold tower ready to start work putting an RSJ above and getting a staircase put in. Scaffold tower fitted nicely around the ladder, there can't be too many digs you can fit a scaff tower in apart from Templeton!

9/8/16

Estelle Sandford, James Begley, Duncan Butler, Stu Lindsay, Duncan Simey

2.5hrs

Estelle was late getting there down to work, but the others got stuck in and lots of progress made on the middle of the digs. Slight draught and easy digging in the mud and rocks. Duncan B had a dig, followed by Estelle and then James. The mountain outside is getting greater!

2/8/16

Estelle Sandford, Duncan Simey, Mike Moxon, Jackie Bishop, Anya Keatley, Mike Waterworth

2hours

After Mike M had shown Jackie around as her first trip, they joined in digging and we were digging from both digs and clearing the spoil - good progress in both cases. The spoil mountain is getting higher and higher! Ladder work for new staircase had to be delayed as too much rain and it would have been dangerous working near the edge. Hopefully next week... 

26/7/16

Estelle Sandford, James Begley, Stu Lindsay and Mike Moxon

2.5hrs

Mike had arrived earlier and gone in on his own to the top end dig at the very top. James and Estelle arrived and Kevin showed off the new staircase he has acquired for putting in there instead of the dodgy ladder - like a stairway to heaven or something... Anyway plan for as many as possible to arrive from 6pm next week to try and install it.

Stu arrived soon after and we headed down and removed all the ceiling rocks we could between the 3 of us that were on the floor from last week's effort. Stu then set to capping the last 3 big ones that were too big to move while Estelle and James dug in the bottom hole. Mike continued to dig the other dig on his own. Estelle removed 2 large boulders from the wall in the bottom dig also. We then joined Stu and assisted clearing the remaining broken up rocks before pub called. Quick look at the end seems to be draughting from the right... Mike thought the dig he was working on at the top was draughting from the left and it's very close to this dig as the survey showed.  

19th July 16

Estelle Sandford, James Begley, Duncan Simey, Mike Moxon, Stu Lindsay, Sarah Payne

2hrs

digging in usual middle hole, starting to get drier mud in general and still pulling out reasonable sized water worn cobbles and rocks from the floor. About 2.rds of the way through the session started to look at a rock in the roof above the dig and thought perhaps it might not be so secure, so made the decision to gently bar it and see what happened - it came down rather easily! We then decided to have a go at a few more bits of the roof that appeared to have gaps or looked like they were being held up by mud cement! Quite a lot of the roof brought down. Cleared some of it and then Mike had a final go at it and we'll have a proper look next week for safety and remove what's there. 3 large rocks need capping. 

Tuesday 12th July

Present: James Begley, Duncan Butler, Mike Moxon (?) and special guest Jon Riley.

Estelle was away with the puffins at Skomer, so it was a reduced team to go digging at Cutlers, boosted by the arrival of a guest digger, Jonathan Riley. Whilst James gave Jon a guided tour of the dig sites, the others started to clear the spoil left over from the previous weeks session at the middle dig site. James and Jon then went to the lower dig site and moved some mud and rocks, whilst the others continued to work at the middle dig site until the call of the beer at the Waldegreave Arms became too strong and we left for some refreshment.

5/7/16

Estelle Sandford, James Begley, Claire Havard and Kevin Clinton joined us to catch up with what we'd been doing.

2hrs

Claire's first visit so lifelined her down the ladder before showing her the digs and then letting her explore the top bit with Kevin who had been away for a few months and we've made a lot of progress on the lower digs, although he's still keen the top digs look interesting. The draught of the middle dig was good again and that is what makes it most interesting. James dug for a while then Claire had a go then we gave up and went to the pub. 

14/6/16

Estelle Sandford, Mike Moxon, Duncan Simey, James Begley, Andrew Atkinson

2.5hrs

James and Andrew continued the survey, while Estelle, Duncan and Mike set to clearing out the bang debris in order to get a look at the way on in the floor. The bang debris was so great, it took most of the digging session to clear it, but eventually Duncan was able to squeeze in a little way and fire a camera around the corner at the end. The end doesn’t look greatly inspiring at the moment, but the site was draughting well at various stages of the evening. Our spoil heap is about 2m higher than it was when dug out now. The survey gave us 113m for the main hole, which was longer than expected and the lowest point is actually in one of the very top digs, but the whole thing trends towards Sherborne Springs/Cheddar sort of direction. 

7/6/16

Estelle Sandford, James Begley, Mike Moxon, Stu Lindsay, Mike Waterworth, Anya Keatley, Duncan Butler, Duncan Simey, Andrew Atkinson
2.5hrs
Estelle and Stu headed into top dig to drill and set up the bang – 8 holes drilled and quite a few boulders included. Andrew and James set to surveying the other holes to start with and the rest worked on the bottom hole, with Mike Waterworth climbing up the opposite side and digging a bit up there. Once drilled and set up, we all headed up top while it was banged. It took longer than previous to clear, but was just about ok to go down and check. Nicely turned to gravel ready for clearing next week. 

4/6/16 digfest weekend

Estelle Sandford, Duncan Butler, Sam Goodyear, Pat Hillier, Olivia Dawson, Rostam Namaghi, Jonathan booth
3hrs 45mins
Part of the digfest weekend, we gained some extra diggers. Duncan set to work with Jonathan, Pat and Oli in the top dig while I worked with Rostam and Sam in the bottom dig. Soon the bottom dig was getting drier mud coming out and is looking really quite big. Jonathan went in after Sam and had a good go, while Oli did some capping with Duncan in the top dig. By the end of the session the top dig needs banging and the bottom dig is easy digging and drier. 

31/5/16

failed to access, gate failure with no electric supplied to it so couldn't get in the driveway!

24/5/16

Estelle Sandford, James Begley, Stu Lindsay
2.5hrs
James set to digging with Estelle in middle for haul and skip filling and Stu pulling from the end and dumping it, then Estelle and Stu swapped and eventually Estelle and James swapped. The hauling is really hard with only 3 of us there, we need more people next time as it’s quite backbreaking!
At the end of the digging, Estelle had exposed a second hole above the first one which gives a bit more visibility into the way on, but it is low and water worn and will need a lot of digging down still. At least we have a solid roof to follow though. 

17/5/16

Estelle Sandford, James Begley, Mike Moxon, Duncan Butler, Stu Lindsay
2hrs
Duncan brought capping kit so set to work capping the big boulder in the way in the top dig first, then another in the dig, while Estelle dug. He then moved to capping the boulder in the bottom dig leaving the rest hauling out lots of spoil created by Estelle. By the end of the session it was possible to stand up in the chamber and there is a hole in the floor which is draughting and turning left and then right from what can be seen, as it’s not very big. 

3/5/16

Estelle Sandford, James Begley, Mike Moxon
2hrs
Lots of spoil and rocks continuing to be removed from the top of the two lower digs. Quite easy digging, so chamber getting bigger. Could do with capping 2 rocks next week that are slightly larger than moveable at the moment. 

26/4/16

Estelle Sandford, James Begley, Mike Moxon, Duncan Simey
2hrs
arrive to find the place 'gated'! Fortunately we were able to get hold of Kevin for the access code as he'd forgotten about us coming!
Got to work with digging and removing all the bang debris from the top of the two bottom digs. Easy going, lots of spoil removed and opening up a bit of a chamber at the end in order to try and work out which way on to dig at the moment as it's not obvious, but there is a lot of mud and rocks... 

19/4/16

Estelle Sandford, James Begley, Mike Moxon, Stu Lindsay, Duncan Simey
2.5hrs
Stu drilled and banged the bottom dig and nicely demolished the right hand wall boulder and the one at the end. This now needs a lot of clearing and hopefully we now have plenty of space to haul as well. Estelle then drilled and banged in the top dig to finish off the available bang. That made a satisfactory sound which resonated around!

12/4/16

Estelle Sandford, James Begley, Mike Moxon, Leonie Woodward, Stu Lindsay, Mike Waterworth, Duncan Butler, Fran Campbell
2.5hrs
Mike and Leonie were already doing toad rescue from the other holes when everyone else started arriving. Stu set to capping a rock in the bottom dig while some of the others were continuing removing spoil and breaking rocks in the upper dig. After a few caps, the rock broke up a fair bit, but the right hand wall boulder showed signs of being unstable, so it was deemed to plan to bang that one next week. Duncan and Estelle continued removing rocks and mud from that side making it larger while being a little mindful of the slightly mobile rock.
Stu then went up to the upper dig and continued capping in there while the others dug and hauled. They managed to make a round trip in there and lots more spoil coming out making it bigger and bigger! Not so many toads this week, probably 30-40ish total. 

5/4/16

Estelle Sandford, James Begley, Mike Waterworth, Dave King, Stu Lindsay
2.5hrs
Stu got to work drilling for a bang and Dave started collecting toads from around the dig. When the rest of us arrived, Mike helped with the drilling as he had his own drill too and Estelle and James helped Dave collect toads and when we were confident we'd removed all we could find this week in that hole, we also cleared as many toads, frogs and newts from hole 1 as we could find too. Probably circa 40 in our current hole and 50+ with 3 newts in the first dig! All were dumped down by the pond in a hope they can find a new life there without being eaten too quick!
A bang was then done in the rocks at the higher of the two bottom digs and about 10mins later we went back. It was a little smelly, but not too bad and there was plenty of damage to the rock and lots of gravel. This was soon cleared and a few large fractured rocks then were easier to remove. Whole site looking a lot bigger now and realistically probably 3 weeks work in one session! Looking to repeat the process next week and maybe cap some rocks in the bottom muddy dig too. 

22/3/16

Estelle Sandford, Mike Moxon, Stu Lindsay, Dave King
2.5hrs
started off with issues with electricity. Kevin's drill required it for us to cap in there. After a bit of fettling, the neutral wire was found to be off in the top extension lead, so once repaired, we took the drill down and Stu started capping while Mike went into the dig to dig.  Estelle and Dave initially went scouting for frogs and toads and removed some more to the pond before helping Stu. Bottom dig still wet and needs the rocks capped, but focused on capping the top rocks and have removed quite a lot more rock now. 

15/3/16

Estelle Sandford, Mike Moxon, Stu Lindsay, Duncan Simey
2hrs
the bottom hole had clearly flooded again since the last time we were there, probably on the Tuesday night after we left as been dry most of the week since. We found quite a lot of frogs and toads, one of them a very heavily pregnant female frog and these were evacuated to the pond before settling in with hammers and chisel to beast the rocks in the upper of the two digs. Mike mostly digging in the dig and the rest of us taking turns with the hammer and chisel. Moved quite a lot of large rock out of the way, really does need capping to make life easier. 

8/3/16

Estelle Sandford, James Begley, Mike Moxon, Leonie Woodward, Duncan Simey
2hrs
Continued work digging in the bottom dig with Estelle digging first followed by Duncan. You can see a 'tide mark' of leaves about 6ft up from the entrance of the bottom dig where the dig had flooded during Storm Imogen last month. The top layer of clay in the dig was particularly slimy! Mike spent most of the evening trying to reduce a rock in size with a hammer to get it out of the way, but the rock won. 2 toads rescued and put into pond.
We really need to get some capping done next week, 5 rocks in lower dig and a couple in upper dig. 

16/2/16 - logging on behalf of Mike Moxon

Last Tuesday Stu L & I arrived at the dig to find a lot of leaves plastered around the walls & the slope between both entrances had slumped, burying the extension cable. The mud was everywhere slick & we realised the hole had flooded to about 2 foot above the lower entrance (just as well we gave the previous Tuesday a miss!). We cleared a lot of mud out of / away from the lower entrance to prevent it getting washed in again, but guess the mud we are chucking into the bottom is reducing the drainage. When Dave King arrived we tirfored the big boulder further out of the way & took the winch out to the surface so it can be washed (along with the drill for drying). There was a large frog in the corner dig, who must have been woken up by the water - we left him down there.

2/2/16

Estelle Sandford, James Begley, Mike Moxon, Leonie Woodward, Stu Lindsay, Mike Waterworth
2.5hrs
Continuing digging in both higher and lower of the two bottom digs. Lots of mud removed, lots still to come out! 

12/1/16

Estelle Sandford, James Begley, Mike Moxon, Mike Waterworth, Mike Butcher, Stu Lindsay, Duncan Butler and Kevin Clinton joined us too.
2.5hrs
Kevin has got a turfer winch to remove large boulders, so Stu, Duncan and Kevin were drilling and bolting a bit boulder to move it while Estelle, Mike Butcher and James were digging in the lower dig and other Mikes x2 were digging behind where the big boulder was being attempted to be removed. For safety, when they were working on that we had to exit the lower dig and it was bitterly cold waiting for the attempts before being able to get back in and did. By the end of the session a very large (circa 5 tonne(?)) boulder had been moved a few feet and rotated out of the mud, but not quite exited so we left for the pub! 

5/1/16

Estelle Sandford, James Begley, Mike Moxon, Leonie Woodward, Mike Waterworth, Stu Lindsay, Duncan Butler
2hrs
Estelle, James and Duncan set to work on the bottom dig with Estelle in the bottom digging to start and then Duncan taking over while the rest of us helped clear spoil out as it needs 3 people now it's round the corner. Looks quite interesting and the clay is certainly very good quality.
Mike x2, Stu and Leonie worked on the dig above with lots of rock splitting and digging out in the end of it. All looking a lot bigger when we'd finished.

Additional note, Kevin sent Estelle a couple of photos the next day showing that he had removed some of the larger boulders from the front of the digs with a new winch he has got and will join us next Tues to work out what else needs removing. 

15/12/15

Estelle Sandford, James Begley, Mike Moxon, Mike Waterworth, Fran Campbell, Duncan Butler

2.5hrs

Continued digging in the bottom dig making it larger so it's easier to get into the new bit and carry on digging. The 'aven' looks like just it might go to the type of shafts we already have as it's not really that far below the surface, but it is quite wet and washed clean. Loads of clay and rock removed from there by Estelle, Fran and Mike W. Duncan, Mike M and James focused on the one blocked with boulders and removed quite a few more. Much easier when they are capped though when Stu is back!

8/12/15

James Begley, Mike Waterworth, Lee Knight & John Boulton

2 hours

We met up to show Lee & John around the site and for them to gather a couple of samples of the biological mats that have been puzzling us. They were shown around the upper dig first, including down into the chamber first explored a couple of weeks earlier, and they collected a couple of samples to be sent off for analysis, but are almost certainly bacterial based. We then went to the lower dig site, where a bit of enthusiastic digging allowed first Mike then the rest of us to extend the lowest dig and get round the corner to a point where there is an aven going upwards for a couple of metres and a trench in the floor full of silt and clay. Digging it out will require making the floor deeper all the way along, but should only take a couple of sessions. Mike also pushed on to the right from the higher dig, to a  low chamber with another aven and what appears to be a connection back to the upper dig – yet to be confirmed.