Olympic Park

Olympic Park Flower Meadows 

Iconic sustainable architecture and ecological landscaping

 

Went to the Olympic Park yesterday. Futuristic environment and impressive landscaping too with an emphasis on wildlife habitats- flower meadows, reed beds, a wetland area and lots of tree planting. Plenty of insects about and quite a few birds too despite the 80,000 people walking around.

Sunny September

Common Buzzard- a few moving through during the week 

Cormorant being mobbed by Carrion Crow 

Green Sandpiper- 15-20 present on site 

Lapwing- less than 20 of these around. Also 1 Snipe, 2-3 Common Sandpiper and not many other waders so pretty poor autumn for waders. However 200+ Teal, 50 Shoveler and 10 Gadwall so a good autumn for waterfowl 

Sedge Warbler- quite a few warblers around- 10+ Reed Warbler, 5+ Sedge Warbler, Blackcap, 10+ Chiffchaff, 2-3 Willow Warbler and the odd Whitethroat 

Small Copper 

Large Fruit Tree Tortrix - a few new moth ticks recently including these three

Hawthorn Moth 

Garden Rose Totrix 

Asparagus Beetle on Asparagus

 

My Beddington pan species list now on 843:
http://peteralfrey.blogspot.co.uk/2012/04/beddington-biodiversity.html

THEE BRYANS

Currently making plans to do some live performances of our nature themed music/art project aimed at young audiences.

Here's a few of our tracks and vids:

Daddy Long Legs
A song about early experiences with nature:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aNV_RI2wMyk&feature=share&list=ULaNV_RI2wMyk

Jaffa
A song about birding buddies:
 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FyZaaF2Q0es&feature=share&list=ULFyZaaF2Q0es

Four Walls (Simon Says) :
A song about the perils of going against human nature
 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BmRDSgVP8ww&feature=share&list=ULBmRDSgVP8ww

I wish
A song about wishing things to be different (better)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oFKD-2L9Z6g&feature=share&list=ULoFKD-2L9Z6g

September Migrants and making Hay

Marsh Harrier- One of two today. Also Common Buzzard, 2-3 Sparrowhawk, Hobby and Kestrel. 

Reed Warbler- a few more warblers about- Chiifys, Willow Warbler, Blackcap, Reed  Warblers and Sedge Warbler. Also looks like an increase in tit numbers. 

Chiffchaff 

Whinchat- one of two on the mound.  Also a Tree Pipit over, the odd Yellow Wagtail, 60+ Swift, 2 House Martin and 1 Swallow

Hybrid duck on the Southern Lake . Lots of waterfowl about today- 100+ Teal, 30+ Shoveler, 6 Gadwall, 6 Little Grebe, 15+ Cormorant and also 12 Green Sand and 3 Common Sandpiper. Still broods of Tufted Duck and Mallard around.

We did the haycut of the wildlflower meadow today. More on our meadows here: http://peteralfreybirdingnotebook.blogspot.co.uk/search?q=Meadows

 

and a bit of Willow control

Moths in the evenings at the moment are dominanted by Setaceous Hebrew Character, Square-spot Rustic, Pale Mottled Willow, Vine's Rustic, Large Yellow Underwing, Copper Underwing, Brimstone, Double-striped Pug, White-point and a few micros. Two Diamond-backed Moths yesterday evening. Jersey Tigers have dissappeared now.

Church and Pub

Meet up this morning with Anna from Sutton's Biodiversity Gardens Project to do a Phase One Survey on the Church grounds and learnt a bit about grasses and dandelion looking plants- which basically are all really confusing.

White Ermine (I-spot id)

Meadow experiment area in Church Grounds- quite a few Agriphila geniculea moths in the longer grass and plenty of composites amongst the grasses e.g. Cat's ears, Hawkweeds, Smooth Sow-thistles. Hopefully we can introduce some more colour into the meadow with some cornflowers, knapweeds, scabious etc. 

 

 Spent the rest of the day going through the Beddington Farmlands Energy Recovery Facility Planning Application and the evening in the pub with Derek and Keith planning our response.

A few of the Beddington Farmlands ERF Planning docs

Carshalton Environmental Fair 2012

Our Stand

Sis Christine helping out 

The Old Man 

Me 

 

Issy listening to thee Bryans

 

Had our nature photography exhibition at the Carshalton Environmental Fair yesterday. All the family helped out.

 

A good success promoting Beddington Farmlands as a Wildlife Photography location (got over 50 people signed up for a photography walk), also got to display some photos from the Azores and other travels and had a little Bryans corner for the kids.