Big Schools Birdwatch

Over the last 2 weeks, The International Community School has been carrying out the Big Schools Birdwatch in the wildlife garden. They saw 4 blue tits, 3 great tits, 2 jays, 3 carrion crows, 2 wood pigeons and 2 blackbirds.

These results go into the large pool of data that the RSPB has collected over the last 2 weeks not only from schools carrying out the birdwatch in their schoolgrounds or local park, but from the hundreds of thousands of people across the country who send in results from their gardens.

The Big Garden Birdwatch and Big Schools Birdwatch have now collected over 25 years worth of data, identifying trends such as the decline in house sparrow numbers in London.

Winter morning in the wildlife garden

The garden took on a white look last week when we had several frosts. The pond was frozen over but as it is 80cm in depth it won't freeze all the way down, not with the milder winters we get in south east England. As you can see from the photo we have left seed heads for food for birds and kep some of the old summer plant cover for insects to shelter in over the winter.

Community Wildlife Garden wins Westminster in Bloom Award

More digging...

On Saturday morning we started digging out 3 new beds, all about the same size. These will be planted with wildlife-friendly shrubs and trees such as berberis, hazel and dog rose.

They are located between the seating by the pond and the tennis courts and have been placed to break up the view of the tennis courts, much like the trees further along the wildlife garden do.

Weather permitting, the beds will be planted in a couple of weeks. Unfortunately we dug out the beds too late to catch the frosts that we had last week which would have broken the soil down nicely, but we'll keep our fingers crossed for a couple more frosts after this wet weather period!

Bats in the park

Over the last few weeks, bats will have been finding places to hibernate over the winter period. Our bat boxes have been installed in the trees for several weeks now, but it is unikely they will be used this winter. It is known that bat boxes often have to be around for several years before they get used.

Maybe our boxes will be used for a summer home one year. Summer is when bats form their maternity roosts, where the bats have their young and these can be returned to year after year.

We may never know if the boxes have been used. It is illegal to disturb bats so, unlike the bird boxes, we will never be cleaning the bat boxes out!

Bird feeders galore

Over 100 people came to visit the wildlife garden last Saturday to discover more about birds and what they can do to help the birds that live near them. Families took part in bird trails, made bird feeders to take home as well as for the wildlife garden and played some of the bird feeding games that were on offer. The face painting was particularly popular!

It was a great day to be out in the park (though the shower of rain in the afternoon could have stayed away), with plenty of birds on the nearby bird feeder including great tits, blue tits and a great spotted woodpecker.

Spring bulbs

25 people came to help plant bulbs in the wildlife garden this week. Autumn is the best time for planting bulbs and it is really good to know that we were planting things that were not only going to provide some colour in the garden in spring, but that the flowers will be providing early nectar sources for bees.

We put in bluebell and snowdrop bulbs, along with some wood anemone rhizomes. The bulbs were put in under the trees along with red campion plug plants so that during the spring we will have a mix of white, blue and then red flowers. The anemones were put under a different tree, along by a hedge as they don't usually grow with grass and like leaf-rich soil.

Completion of the newt

A group from Kinsbury Manor Day Centre visited the wildlife garden for the second time yesterday. They came to finish the newt sculpture! The newt now has a crest of wild flowers along its back and its eyes and nostrils have been completed with mosaic tiling. It looks great!

The flowers forming its crest are the purple-flowering selfheal and autumn hawkbit, which has yellow flowers. Both of these will withstand people walking on them so the newt will still be accessible to sit and climb onto.

Planting this week

This week sees us planting some bergenias in the front garden; these are plants that are tolerant of shade and will hopefully still bloom well in the dry and shady conditions caused by the nearby London plane trees.

We are also planting some Dog violet plug plants into the sides of the raised bed. The wooden roundels, that make up the sides of the raised bed, came from old children's playground equipment and have holes in their sides where the bolts used to sit. We are going to use these to plant the Dog violets into.

Bog revival

The bog has been one of the least successful areas we planted in the spring because we have had difficulty getting the water level right. During the wet summer, the water level was above the crowns of the plants killing many of them.

Last Saturday we put some more soil in the bog and replanted the end which had died off. We all thought it was a glorious day to be outside getting down to some gardening.

In the past we haven't wanted to create too many holes in the liner, but now we have been given a water supply to the pond using the pump which takes water up to the top of the cascade into the lake. This means that we can add water to the bog from the pond whenever we want so we can make additional holes in the liner as we need to.

Garden Wins Westminster in Bloom Competition!

The Community Wildlife garden has won 1st prize in the prestigious Westminster in Bloom competition! Judges were impressed with the variety of wildlife friendly features on display and with the sustainable methods that are being used within the garden. The award recognises all the hard work that volunteers and community groups have put into creating such a fantastic garden for wildlife. We'd like to say a big thank you to everyone who's been involved so far.

Towards the end of summer

It feels like the sunshine has only just appeared, but for many plants and animals the summer is already over. Some of our flowers are coming to the end of their flowering season and annuals such as the pot marigolds are beginning to look a little past their best!

We won't be cutting many of the dead stems down as insects such as ladybirds and lacewings use these for hibernating in. Also many of the plants' seedheads will be providing food for animals for a while to come yet!

The pond is the only place where we will remove most of the dead vegetation and this is because we don't want too much of it falling into the pond. Too much rotting vegetation causes the pond to become depleted of oxygen, which isn't good news for the pond animals.

During August it has been more difficult to see the birds as many of them go through their moult. However this period has nearly past and we are starting to see the wrens and dunnocks looking for food again in our flower beds.

Pond comes to life

The pond is starting to come to life. It is now full of oxygenating plants which are keeping the water clear and the floating leaved plants are starting to cover the water surface. Dragonflies are flying around the top of it and pond skaters are skimming the surface.

We are now getting a water supply linked from the nearby lake to the pond so that we can always top the pond up as the water level drops. This will be great when we get periods without any rain.

Today a dunnock was spotted using the pond to drink from and a wren was spotted in the flower beds using the denser plants as cover at the end of last week.

Flowers of the garden

These red flowers, on plants called sneezeweed, are proving very popular with bees. These are in the circular raised bed that we built which has been planted with nectar-rich flowers. The purple flower is a cardoon which is like a giant thistle. The flowers of these are also full of nectar but the seeds produced later this year will be eaten by birds.

More rain!

More rain fell on the garden this week; we have certainly saved time in watering effort this year! The garden is flourishing with the mix of sun and rain and more flowers are appearing all the time.

This week the Angelica gigas came into bloom and its red flowers are proving highly attractive to bumblebees.

The bog is back filled with water again and some of the plants are struggling a bit as they are spending too long covered with water, rather than just their roots being in water. However we can hopefully rectify that later in the year by putting some more earth into the bog and raise the plants' crowns above the water level.

Summer in the garden

Newt-tastic

We finally finished our earth sculpture this week after many hours of hard work and it is looking great. Even if we do say so ourselves...

The eyes will be finished with mosaic and we will also plant some wild flower plugs later in the year when the grass has established.

Just as long as these storms don't wash the whole sculpture away!

At the weekend, the head of the newt turned green! It was clad with a clay and straw mixture before being turfed. We are now ready to cover the rest of the newt this coming week!

Rain makes garden flourish!

A whole different range of plants are now coming into flower. Our clematis on the obelisk has come out and will hopefully produce lots of wonderful seed heads in the autumn.

Also coming into flower are the Echinacea and the Echinops both of which have nectar for bees and butteflies. The red hot pokers are also good for nectar, which not only insects love, but birds love to drink too.

The pond is starting to look a bit more established and the floating leaved plants are beginnning to spread. And the new bird feeders are providing regular food for the great tits and also spotted on the feeder has been a great spotted woodpecker.

A giant newt!

It poured, the wind blew and the sun shone, yet a determined team of volunteers battled on to create a giant earth sculpture of a newt in Regent’s Park over the weekend.

First, the shape was cut into the existing turf. Next, the profile was created with clay and straw before bags of earth were used to form the three-dimensional body of the giant five metre long amphibian. Time defeated us in creating the sculpture over the weekend, but this week, we will be cladding it with clay and turfing it.