Saturday 12 December saw the Friends of Shrewsbury Park Management Committee gather to plant some shrubs and small trees donated by the Woodland Trust.
We managed to plant around 150 plus some daffodils!
If this looks like loads of fun (it was!) then drop us a message and we will let you know the date and time of the next big dig!
Delivery to the SE18, SE2 or DA16 postcodes is free of charge.
We have received regulations, apologies and encouragement to pass on from the Royal Borough of Greenwich. This is a recap for your information.
And most of all, continue to appreciate the park. Although we can’t guarantee any walks or events in Shrewsbury Park for the near future, the ideas remain fresh and ready to go.
If you are doing your solitary exercise, listening to the birds and the buds popping open, and you see a photo opportunity or have some creative thoughts please send your pictures to us at werfsp@gmail.com and we’ll add them to a gallery here.
Best wishes for your safety and calm in the coming weeks. Nature is doing it’s best to keep us cheerful.
Kris and the Management Committee
From Rob Goring, Strategy and Development Manager of Parks and Open Spaces:
As of 25 March we will be temporarily closing all:
All park cafes should also be closing but some may remain open to provide takeaway services only.
Our parks will remain open to allow people to exercise once a day but people using our parks should social distance and keep at least 2 metres away from people outside their households.
No more than 2 people may gather in our parks and open spaces except where the gathering is of a group of people who live together – this means that a parent can, for example, take their children to the shops if there is no option to leave them at home.
Most parks office staff are remote working i.e. working from home and Grounds Maintenance staff and Park Rangers are not classified as key workers and therefore will not be attending work, in-line with government instructions. However, if possible we may have a couple of Rangers/Ranger Managers working each day to carry out checks in parks.
Our Cemeteries and Crematorium are open and operating as normal but again in line with government instructions people should social distance where possible and keep at least 2 metres away from people outside their households. In terms of people attending funeral services it is advised that only members of the immediate family should attend.
Spring is truly blossoming now and birds are busy everywhere. Spend some time rediscovering the bird boxes along Dothill path and the various holes in trees.
National Dawn Chorus Day is Sunday 2 May and the RSPB has an excellent ID guide to birdsong (for 20 species) for you to learn before then; or any morning you’re up at dawn…
So open your windows wide or scamper over to the Park at 5.30am on or around May the 2nd for a real treat. You may even see bats returning to roost.
BIrd song identification
https://www.rspb.org.uk/birds-and-wildlife/bird-songs/what-bird-is-that/
RSPB site for Dawn Chorus facts
https://www.rspb.org.uk/reserves-and-events/events-dates-and-inspiration/events/dawn-chorus/
Should be a lot on Twitter too……
Our plans for this year’s AGM have been scuppered so we are just going to update you on news of the park and leave the Management Committee the same for now: Sandra Bauer, Paul Buckley, Alan Deacon, Kris Inglis, Sonja O’Sullivan, Ron Senkus, Irene Telfer and Iris White. If you would like to join the committee and get more involved, there is a link to use later in this email. New members are always welcome.
Arising from the 2019 AGM:
Summary of past year…
We held a successful 2019 Quiz night with Shrewsbury House in November that proved a fun time and a good fundraiser. A member alerted us to the Celebrate National Lottery 25 Grant and turned the application around to meet the deadline. This gave us £775 for wildlife monitoring equipment, a decision based on last year’s AGM discussion of habitats. We have materials for hedgehog surveying, a nature cam and two bat detectors so far and look forward to working parties being able to carry out investigations. Many thanks to Les for all his efforts on this application.
After cancelling the March Bird Walk it became clear that every visit to the park would have to be self-directed for the foreseeable future. No Summer Festival, just walks for exercise, play, reflection and running around madly became the main focus. Thank you to everyone who continued to encourage social distancing, responsible picnicking and considerate dog walking during the most stressful times. Many people discovered the pleasure of this open space and experienced the natural world on our doorstep.
Have you seen the video showcasing FSP and the park? Or taken a turn on the swing that appeared in April?
Thankyous
We’ve had help with habitat management this summer. One was a survey done by Joe Beale, local environmentalist, who walked the park with a few members to identify habitat diversity and make suggestions as to how we can appropriately support and manage the space.
The Royal Borough of Greenwich Parks and Open Spaces were very cooperative when approached with FSP meadow care concerns: when they met myself and Les Clark they had already mapped out the next two years’ mowing from the same environmental criteria. There is a lot of expertise and experience we can draw on in P and OS.
Thanks to Michelle for providing several months of hedgehog news and guidance posted on the website. And to Les and Liz for establishing watering stations for wildlife throughout the summer and now. Thanks also to Sandra for providing the impetus and editing of the above mentioned video. And thanks to Anthony Hurren who shared his lockdown nature video and won the cover place on the 2021 calendar.
The Lockdown Gallery on the website started in March was a huge success – thanks for kicking it off, John! And of course this fed naturally into the 2021 calendar with voting online that went surprisingly well. The sale of the 2021 calendar was very successful and thanks for spreading the resulting product far and wide. The price increased to £6.50 this year and we sold about half in just one of those glorious weekends in the park in July. Results in the Treasurer’s report THERE ARE STILL 3 LEFT! Contact werfsp@gmail.com to get one.
May the new year bring more activities back to the park and keep all those positive ones that you’ve discovered in 2020. Feel free to send any suggestions or concerns via the email address.
See you in the Park
Kris Inglis, Chair
Those hedgehogs that had their litters in June will have started to take their babies out on foraging trips at night. This is so that the babies start to learn to find food for themselves. They won’t leave their mother just yet through, returning to the nest with her and continuing to take her milk as well as the food they find whilst out and about. It’ll be a few more weeks before they’re ready to leave, but they will be starting to develop the vital skills that they need to be able to survive on their own.
Did you know: the biggest predator of hedgehogs in the UK is the badger. Find out more here.
You may have seen in the news , headlines telling us that a number of our beloved native species are seriously in danger Amongst them is the hedgehog. If we all do a little bit to improve the environment for our prickly friends, we can play our part in helping to change that. Here are the things that you can be doing this month in your garden and in the local area to be kind to hedgehogs:
SPOTTED A HEDGEHOG IN YOUR GARDEN? If you spot a hedgehog either in your garden or somewhere in the local area, please let us know. It would be really exciting to build up a picture of where and when they are being seen locally.
You can also log your sightings with Hedgehog Street (the project run by the Hedgehog Preservation Society) who are building up a national picture of the state of our hog population. Find out more here
If you spot a hedgehog out during the middle of the day, they may well be in trouble. Contact Willow Wildlife for advice on 07956 472284 or Michelle (on behalf of Friends of Shrewsbury Park) on 07849 534759.
More from the Hedgehog Diaries next month.
We’re taking part in Severndroog Castle’s online festival from 29 August, and they asked us to make a video to support it.
As we learned last month, May was when the hedgehog breeding season started to get into full swing. Once pregnant, it will be around four weeks before a hedgehog mother gives birth to her litter. The number of hoglets born will normally be between four and five.
For those mothers who started the breeding season early, their hoglets may already have started to emerge from the nest. It’s more likely that you’ll start to see babies in July, but keep your eyes open because you never know when they’ll be about.
Did you know that a hedgehog can live for up to 6 years? Find out MORE HERE.
Here are our top hedgehog tips for this month:
SPOTTED A HEDGEHOG? If you spot a hedgehog either in your garden or somewhere in the local area, please let us know. It would be really exciting to build up a picture of where and when they are being seen locally.
You can also log your sightings with Hedgehog Street (project run by the Hedgehog Preservation Society) who are building up a national picture of the state of our hog population. Find out MORE HERE. ‘Make a hole, make a difference!’
CONTINUE TO PROVIDE FRESH WATER Although we’ve had a lot of rain in recent weeks, fresh water remains an important resource. Continue to put out a shallow dish in your garden and keep it topped up with fresh water throughout the month.
GARDEN PONDS If you have a pond in your garden, you may get hedgehogs visiting for water and to find yummy invertebrates to eat. Always make sure that there is an escape route, with a gentle shelved area to allow any animals who fall in to the water a to get out easily. Hedgehogs can swim, but may drown if they are unable to climb out of the water.
LITTER PICK Sadly, there have been instances of littering in our parks and open spaces. If you’re out and about and see something that could be harmful to wildlife, please consider carefully picking it up and placing it in a bin. Always be aware of vital hand hygiene, though, and it’s recommended that you wear gloves. Thoroughly wash your hands for at least 20 seconds if you touch anything that has been discarded.
Some of the things that can be particularly harmful to animals like hedgehogs include:
NOT BUILT YOUR HEDGEHOG SUPER-HIGHWAY YET? Don’t forget that it’s a simple case of cutting a 13 cm x 13 cm hole at the bottom of a fence panel to create one. This gives hedgehogs the chance to roam between gardens, find suitable nesting spaces and a plentiful supply of health food and water.
Check out recent VIDEO HERE Got any grub….
More from the Hedgehog Diaries next month.
Keep an ear out for loud grunting and snuffling noises in the garden at night. This could be a giveaway of amorous hedgehog activity.
Did you know, that after mating, the male hedgehog leaves and takes no part in rearing the young? You may see a hedgehog collecting leaves for bedding material, it’s possible this could be a female preparing her nest for the arrival of her babies. If you’d like to know more about hedgehog mating behaviour, you can read more here. https://www.hedgehogstreet.org/about-hedgehogs/hoglets/
Here are some of the things that you can be doing in May to help for the arrival of this season’s baby hedgehogs.
We’re still experiencing very dry conditions, so the top recommendation this month is to continue to put out plenty of fresh water. Use shallow bowls that are easy for the hedgehogs to drink from.
Remember that meaty dog or cat food is a great supplement to their diet. Whilst beetles are their favourite, putting out a bowl of food will give them an extra boost.
Strimmers are one of the biggest causes of serious injury & death for garden hedgehogs. If you are using a strimmer, please check all areas of long grass and brambles carefully first. A hedgehog was found in the park a couple of years ago that had suffered a rear leg amputation. Sadly the hog had to be put to sleep, and it was felt highly likely that he or she had suffered a strimmer injury.
Hedgehogs will often bed down in overgrown areas of a garden. If you can leave at least one area untouched, then the wildlife will love you forever! You’ll benefit from visits from bees and butterflies as well as other species. If you include some dead wood, you’re also creating the perfect habitat for our endangered stag beetles. Visit https://ptes.org/campaigns/stag-beetles-2/stag-beetle-facts/
If you haven’t yet spoken to your neighbours about creating a hedgehog super-highway, then there’s no time like the present. Just a 13 cm x 13 cm hole at the bottom of a fence panel is all it takes. You could be rewarded with the pitter-patter of tiny hoglet paws in the months to come if you do!
We can proudly announce the first of a continuing series of Hedgehog Diaries written by Michelle, an FSP member and hedgehog champion.
