The hard working Hackers cut rooikrans in Crassula Crescent on Wednesday 19 June and kindly left some large piles of branches near the road for easy access for us. They also cut it into smaller pieces to make our task easier. Thanks Dave and team – that was really appreciated!

Five enthusiastic young Pringle House Eco School learners joined us for the first time to help move branches from the piles for loading onto the bakkies and trailer.  They added a definite “youth” aspect to the group, and livened up the morning with their chatter and song. Thanks to Adele the Principle, teacher Micaela, one of the dads and Nika-lee, Mbali, Morgan, Nadia and Scarlett for joining us. I hope you enjoyed the visit to the colony after your hard work!

The older contingent did their fair share of loading and offloading.

Thanks to Robbie, Joggie and Wessel who added the  three additional vehicles/ trailers to complement the CapeNature bakkie. They worked together with Lenore and Duncan, Marie and Luka her young neighbour, Conrad, “dad”, Graham, Carol and Engela. Curtly and Winfrey from Stony Point also joined us. The four vehicles offloaded their stash at Stony Point and in total 16 loads were delivered to the colony that morning. The Stony Point staff can now use the hacked branches in the colony for nesting materials for the penguins.

Thanks to all the first timers who joined in, as well as to Robbie who has helped at all four events!

Now that the Stony Point staff had a pile of hacked rooikrans on site, they needed some more helping hands to create “easy to carry” bundles of branches.

Thanks to all those “willing bundlers” of various ages who responded to the BBC call for help on Tuesday 25 June and joined Curtly Ambrose from Stony Point: Zelda, Ruargh with Xavier and Teague, Colin, Jill, Anneke, Philip, Theresa, Andrea, David, Bill, Lisa with Max, Born and Soren. From Curtly: “Thank you again for the help. You did an amazing job”

The Stony Point staff will take the bundles into the colony to where they are needed as nesting material for the penguins.

This was a productive chain of team effort between the Hackers, BBC “loaders/ transport” and “bundlers” and the Stony Point staff! The rooikrans has been removed from the fynbos in that area and has been re-purposed for practical use in the colony to help the penguins.

If you would like to join in the fun on future BBC Penguin-Pals events, please contact bettysbayconservancy@gmail.com

Bundling Photos: Curtly Ambrose and Zav Potgieter

Carol Clark

Chair of the Betty’s Bay Conservancy