Margaret Wilson of Approach Gardens writes: Approach Gardens received a Tower Habitats grant from the Tower Hill Trust in March this year. We have used the money to create lots of new wildlife habitats in the garden, adding to what we did under a previous grant. A lot of the focus has been on providing more nectar for pollinating insects – this help wildlife and also helps our food growers, as many of our crops require insect pollination. “Nectar bars” (left) were added to the end of some of the food growing beds, with a wide range of nectar-rich perennials…
Author: admin
The unseasonally warm and sunny weather has brought out a surprising number of butterflies, with no fewer than seven species noted in Tower Hamlets on 25 October. As usual, Tower Hamlets Cemetery Park was the best butterfly site, with a Clouded Yellow in Scrapyard Meadow the most notable sighting. This species, a scarce visitor to Britain only a few years ago, is now a regular migrant, with a few breeding in southern England. A Clouded Yellow was seen in Scrapyard Meadow at the beginning of the month (when the photo on the left was taken by Ken Greenway), and another…
Ben Fenton of Thames21 writes: Thames21 volunteers have installed a 36-metre-long floating ecosystem on the Limehouse Cut, close to Bartlett Park. This will bring new habitats to the area, and improve the biodiversity of this section of the canal, which currently lacks aquatic vegetation. The floating rafts have been planted with a variety of native wetland plants, including Purple Loosestrife, Marsh Marigold, Water Mint, sedges and more. These will provide cover for water birds and other wildlife, as well as an attractive green edge to the canal with some colourful flowers. The plant roots will hang into the water, improving…
The curse of the UK summer holiday weather struck Big Butterfly Count 2017. For butterflies and butterfly counters, July and August were dominated by unsettled weather and above average rainfall. Overall it was one of the wettest UK summers for 100 years. And this after six months (January-June) of above average monthly temperatures, which encouraged butterflies to emerge earlier than usual. The combined impacts of this topsy-turvy weather were to reduce the numbers of butterflies seen during Big Butterfly Count 2017, both because the abundance of some species was reduced by the summer weather and because others, such as the…
Volunteers again rescued hundreds of frogs and other amphibians in Victoria Park on 9-10 October. Early October is the time when the fading summer bedding plants are stripped from Victoria Park’s Sunken Garden, to make way for fresh winter/spring bedding. This exposes large numbers of frogs, toads and newts, which like the damp shelter of the flower beds, to predators such as Carrion Crows and Magpies. Following last autumn’s successful rescue operation, the Biodiversity Officer, with help from the Friends of Victoria Park, again recruited a rota of volunteers to move the amphibians to the safety of nearby shrubberies. As…
Dave Bedford and Molly Gadenz of the Lower Regents Coalition write: Good news! We’ve been shortlisted for the Grassroots Giving Fund by the Skipton Building Society! Will you please give us your vote to help keep our group going? In order to fairly allocate the funds, the Skipton Building Society asks the public to decide who they would like to receive the funding. The shortlisted applicants, including the Lower Regents Coalition, are profiled on the Skipton’s website, Twitter and Facebook, as well as in the local media, to help raise awareness of the work that we do, and to encourage…
An unused space behind the Royal London Hospital has been transformed into a peaceful, green oasis and aims to deliver a relaxing, therapeutic space to promote positive mental health. The space at Stepney Way, Whitechapel E1 2JL was officially opened on 19 September to celebrate health and horticulture. The project was invited to the Royal London Hospital site by Tower Hamlets Council’s Whitechapel Vision delivery team, the public health team and Barts Health NHS Trust. The garden project by Core Landscapes is designed to be movable making use of temporarily available land as and when it becomes available so everything…
For the second year running, no Common Terns bred in Tower Hamlets in 2017. And unlike last year, when birds appeared to be incubating at East India Dock Basin and Blackwall Basin but nests failed, this year there were no nesting attempts at all. At East India Dock Basin, where terns nested successfully up to 2015, a few terns appeared as usual this spring, and a couple of pairs were active around the rafts between May and early July. Territorial behaviour, including courtship displays and aggression towards other terns, were observed, but there were no nesting attempts. As last year,…
Tom Davis, Farm Manager at Mudchute, writes: In late August, six ewes from the Mudchute flock spent a week taking part in a conservation grazing trial in Green Park. While they are far from the first woolly lawnmowers to the park, they do mark the return of sheep to the park for the first time since 1939. Mudchute is proud to be a part of the project in partnership with the Rare Breeds Survival Trust and The Royal Parks. The grazing trial is an aspect of the Royal Parks “Mission: Invertebrate” project, funded with help from the players of People’s…
Ben Fenton of Thames21 writes: We have installed a floating planter into the Limehouse Cut, at its junction with the Lea Navigation, adjacent to Navigation Road in the Bow Locks area. This will provide habitats for fish, water birds and other wildlife, and will help to remediate water pollution. The 12 square metre planter is planted up with a mix of native wetland plants, including Lesser Pond Sedge, Purple Loosestrife, Water Mint, Yellow Flag Iris, Common Club Rush and Reed Canary-grass. This is part of our Community Reedbeds project, funded by Thames Water. The site was voted for by the…