Wildlife Circus

    Following the London Urban Water Management Conference, Thames21 and Enfield Council  organised a tour of the Rainscapes last Tuesday. It was great to see the sites in the raw as well as talk to members of the local Friends groups.  blocked drain and swale Our first stop was at Lonsdale Road and Aimee Felus from Thames 21 and Ian Russel the borough engineer at Enfield council showed us some of the impressive schemes they had colaborated on, that were custom designed to prevent polluted storm water run-off from entering the streams. This included deculverting part of the hidden Glenbrook river along a woodlot .  Misconnections from sources of sewage entered the river through various outfalls but are hidden under the road. Here they are seen and can be dealt with and the process starts with a boom to hold back the worst excesses of pollutants, most recently this has been cement washed into drains from building works which has left an amount of whit...

On Friday team members from Natural England and DEFRA,  from  the south-east and London regions, descended on Tolworth Court Farm Moated Manor on an awayday; to assist us with the ongoing management of the site. Elliot gave a tool talk, prior to participants extending the dead hedge along the boundary with the Hogsmill footpath. Materials were procured from a local woodsman who delivered to us before the day began.   Hazel faggots  and stakes were unloaded and taken to an area under where the previous group - a Duke of Edingburgh award scheme- had finished. By the end of the day our compost toilet had a coat of protective paint and the hedge had increased substantially in length. dead headge Panisha and Robbie painting the compost loo    Participants were surprised at the amount of bird life present as we watched jays,  woodpeckers and kestrels; as well as a number of small birds such as goldfinches.   Many thanks to particip...

 Members of the Richmond Biodiversity Partnership enjoyed a walkover of the paddocks at Hampton Court Park (aka Home Park) to see the newly created wetland habitats- including  sluices to aid control of the Longford River-  installed over the last two years. Part of good stewardship of the wildlife in this  oasis- is the control of mink - prevalent in this catchment, particularly in the river Mole and our stretch of  the Thames.   Male mink skin The  skins emphasised the size difference between  the male and female, with the latter able to gain access to a water vole burrow.The wildlife officer demonstrated the use of the mink rafts, which are in use at many wetland sites in  south-west London. mink raft with the lid off    This one is missing the roof to demonstrate the wet clay, which serves to reveal footprints of the visiting animals, to warn of the possible presence of mink. We were told that the rafts are no longer ...

Over the last two days members of the Environment Agency have been undertaking fish surveys at four locations along the Hogsmill. This is from Hogsmill Lane (just off Villiers Road) to Oakland Way-Chamber Mead KT19 upstream, just  across the borough boundary. This type of survey is  usually undertaken by boat - although backpacks were used in the shallows upstream at Ewell. Circular electrofishing 'anodes' attract the fish, which swim towards the the charged equipment, where they are stunned but not harmed. They are then decanted to large buckets for further examination or 'processing'. During the initial survey  at Elmbridge Meadows, a surprising catch of ~100 fish was made in the first of three runs. This is virtually one fish every metre of the ~90m netted area and included: chub, dace, roach, stone loach, gudgeon, stickleback, minnow, bullhead and an eel. At  Worcester Park Road-Tolworth  A240  a similar number of fish were caught. By far th...