One of our early-risers has sent us a picture of a small red tent pitched just inside the main entrance, right next to the noticeboard on which the NO CAMPING sign is displayed. It may or may not contain the person/people who lit a fire in the picnic place last night.
Reptiles and water voles
by Ian Bushell
Another Wednesday morning work party; another good day and a good turn-out of Friends.
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While the noisier wing of the media has posted loud banner headlines about Bank Holiday Litter Louts, you have kept our reserve pristine. Yesterday, when the Friends met for their Wednesday work party, even the car park was litter-free. Thank you.
Invasive non-native species are one of the top five causes of biodiversity loss worldwide. Here in the UK they harm the environment, threaten some of our rarest species and cost our economy over £1.8 billion a year.
Read on to find out how you can help
Let’s focus on the environment this summer; let’s learn a little, make a contribution of some kind. Here are some ideas.
Continue reading “Things to do”
Another great turn out by the Friends on Wednesday and a beautiful morning to boot.
Continue reading “Wednesday work party”
by Ian Bushell
Not a bad Sunday morning, bright and dry, with no wind but a little chill.
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The park has been so important to so many during this last locked-down year. People have come here for permitted exercise, to run their children and their dogs, to walk off their worries or just to stay sane in an increasingly insane world. Now that we are promised an end to the craziness, it is the park that needs a little help.
Continue reading “We need volunteers”
by Ian Bushell
In 2017 a White-letter Hairstreak butterfly was recorded in the park. These beautiful butterflies are the emblem of Wiltshire Butterfly Conservation group. They feed on English or Wych Elms, which unfortunately over the past few years have been ravaged by Dutch Elm disease, leaving dead gaunt trees within some hedge lines.
Continue reading “Disease Resistant Elms”
On Friday we posted a gallery of grey squirrels, an invasive alien species that has almost completely replaced our native squirrel population. Unfortunately, our native bluebell (Hyacinthoides non-scripta) is also being threatened by the spread of an invasive alien: Spanish squill (Hyacinthoides hispanica), a similar bluebell species imported into our gardens from southern Europe during the 17th and 18th centuries.
by David Feather
A walking organisation in Scotland, called “Paths for All”, has introduced the term micro-volunteering. So, what is micro-volunteering?
Continue reading “Micro-volunteering”
This is Pat, our champion litter picker; yesterday was her 91st birthday.
Continue reading “Happy Birthday Pat”
By Ian Bushell
News of Southwick Country Park achieving Local Nature Reserve Status reverberated in high places!
Continue reading “SCP on the Beeb!”
An update from Ian Bushell:
Continue reading “Damplugger!”
Pictures and a message from Clive Knight, long-time Friend of the Park:
Continue reading “To-do list”
This is the damage in Village Green, caused by what is obviously a child’s motorbike. This is an area where the Friends of Southwick Country Park have focused on increasing biodiversity, encouraging vetches, vetchlings and tares as food plants for the caterpillars of increasingly rare butterflies. We have also planted Fritillaria meleagris corms in this area.
Do you know the parents of the child or children who are riding motorbikes around Village Green?
More pictures, from a member of FoSCP, of the damage to Village Green and Cornfield, taken late this afternoon.
There have been reports of motorbikes being ridden in the park’s fields. The tyre tracks are mostly in Corn Field, Kestrel Field and Lambrok Meadow and seem to show that the bikes enter and leave by the bridge into Lambrok Close. The only motorised vehicles allowed in the park are those maintenance vehicles authorised by Wiltshire Council, and mobility vehicles.
Continue reading “Please: no motorbikes”
…we are foregoing the five gold rings and sending you, instead, five of Clive Knight’s pictures of the park’s Christmas floodwaters.
The following programme of actions was taken as an outcome of the review of the park on 27th January 2013 by the Wiltshire Countryside Team and Friends of Southwick Country Park. It is intended that this is a living document: a record of previous projects, tasks undertaken, an update of works carried out during 2020, and a review of the park in general.
Continue reading “PROJECTS PROGRAMME”
Contractors have cut the hedge between the central path and the pond. It does look a bit brutal at the moment, we know, but all these stumps will make vigorous new growth in the spring.
These are photographs taken last weekend, early on Sunday morning. Whoever it is who is churning up our car park does it on Saturday night; if you know him or her please ask them to stop. Please tell them that our poor car park’s surface is not tarmac, it is rolled planings, and will not last long under such treatment.
Thank you.
There is a Chinese wingnut tree (Pterocarya stenoptera) in the Arboretum.
Continue reading “Wingnut”
Yesterday was FoSCP’s last work party in the park until after this period of lockdown ends. If all goes well, we will next meet on Wednesday, 9th December.
Park users, if you see that there is something to be fixed or damage to be mended, please contact us and we will do our best.
Please, don’t do handbrake turns in our car park!
Continue reading “Handbrake turns”
New fencing at Puddle Corner.
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