One of our most regular jobs around the North York Moors National Park is signage. This is one of those jobs that is done all year round for varying reasons such as nesting bird season, lambing time and so on, to notify about closed routes or, more often, to mark where our rights of way are.
During our apprenticeship we are lucky to be taught the skills to design our own posts which we can then install where we need them, and this is something I have recently done.
To make things more straightforward we buy the posts from a local sawmill and the ‘fingers’ ready-made by a local joiner. It is then our job to work out the direction the sign is to face, and how many fingers to put on it. We also need to make sure we have the right designation for the path, whether a footpath, bridleway or byway etc, and mount waymarker discs if needed.
In the workshop, we have a morticing machine to drill out the slot for the finger to sit in and then once we are happy with that, we can put the finger in, and drill a hole for the dowels. We fit the dowels making sure the ‘fingers’ are nice and snug.
Once the sign is ready, we take it to where it is needed and dig a hole about a third of the length of the post. We then attach a small bit of rail on the bottom of the post to prevent the sign twisting in the ground, or livestock moving it, and then fill and tamp the hole to ensure the ground is nice and compact and the post rigid.
Diary entry by Ambar Hughes, Level 4 Countryside Ranger Apprentice in the South of the North York Moors
