Category Wild Pavements – urban nature adventures
30 days wild – 1. Cox’s Walk, Southwark
It’s the first of my 30 days wild challenges, I’m planning to visit 30 Great North Wood and/or London Wildlife Trust sites in June, and this one is a green space I know well. Cox’s walk is an oak-lined avenue which was created in the 18th century as a short cut through Fifty Acre Wood […]
Wildlife Trusts 30 days wild challenge
So June is the month for the Wildlife Trusts 30 days wild challenge. I’ve spent the morning mapping the London Wildlife Trusts reserves and Great North Wood project sites. I made it 41 in total. While they’re not all open, I’m planning to visit on foot or by bicycle and write about the 30 nearest […]
31st May 2020 – verging on wild
On the north side of Dulwich Wood where it borders a cul de sac, there’s a picket fence of around 200 metres long with a two metre high cherry laurel hedge (yes, ugh!) running along outside it. Between the hedge and road kerb is a grass verge which varies from about one metre to […]
24th May 2020 – the rasp of fledglings and a patch of sweet woodruff
I have baby birds on my mind as I set off into the woods this morning. Our blue tits fledged earlier this week and as the families before them flew straight into the oak tree opposite our house. I was pleased to see them all make this first survival milestone successfully but it seems very […]
17th May 2020 – there’s white and white and was that a cuckoo?
This week the elder flowers are ready for harvesting. My May ritual is burying my nose in a spray of flowers and inhaling the heady scent. The smell is not universally appreciated but it has good associations for me with summer picnics and parties. To be clear, I don’t pick the ones in the woods […]
10th May 2020 – upstaged by a blackbird singing
I’ve been in the woods early twice this week already as I need to record two ten minute readings of some of my blog posts for the @UrbanTreeFestival starting 16th May. It has been far harder than I expected and on occasions excruciatingly frustrating. Each time I’m coming to the end of what I think […]
3rd May 2020 – cutty wrens and the sweets of may
In the woods by the tunnel mouth, I bury my face in a spray of hawthorn blossom, and breathe in the sweet almondy scent. Apparently white from a distance, up close the five-petalled flowers have distinctly pink anthers. In this shady cutting, they positively glow. It’s international dawn chorus day today. I didn’t organise myself […]
26th April 2020 – mapping and mining
When I was a parent of small childen, a map of south east london would have featured playgrounds and child-friendly cafés. With children now grown and independent, I see the same area as an interconnecting set of green patches punctuated by local shops (which might still be selling vegetables). Mapping is important for a number […]
19th April 2020 – well-trodden paths and the quiet American
The woods are still bursting at the seams with exercising visitors. In most cases, we’re all careful to keep our distance and appreciative when others do. But there’s a cost to us avoiding each other. Over the last few weeks, a network of minor paths has become established. It’s not that they weren’t there before, […]
The Urban Naturalist 