Perivale Park London

The relatively wet and warm autumn here has delayed the onset of full tree colour. One of the best displays in the park comes from the row of trees planted along the path parallel to the athletics track. The colour lasts a long time before the leaves drop.

Continue reading “Late autumn colour in 2023 – the avenue of Pear trees.”

A well-used path connecting the bridge across Coston’s brook and the Betham road entrance across the meadow there used to be a main access point to the “tadpole” pond in the park. Thanks Ros for photo!

Continue reading “Overgrown path now clear – thanks to local volunteers.”

Thanks to the relatively late seeding,  the larger flower meadow in the park (in between the orchard area and the MUGA court) has some late autumn colour. Thanks to Michael for some photos.

Continue reading “The meadow in autumn 2023.”

The MUGA (multi-use-games-area) is a games area – where people might run  (or at least trot). When playing games (or even trotting),  you need a level surface where you are not likely to slip. So the photos below show the park MUGA as I found it today.

Continue reading “Vandalism – pure and simple – but not as we know it.”

This proposal certainly has caused much discussion and excitement. I managed to find some more detail, whilst we wait for more of the facts surrounding this proposal  to emerge. This is the link and I only pull out a few snippets from that. Perhaps someone well versed in this sort of speak can identify other important aspects? Continue reading “Creation of a regional park – Some detail. And reference to a lido proposal?”

Horsenden Grape and Honey farm first planted their vines on a south facing sunny slope in Greenford about six years ago. This year the harvest of Solaris grapes was expected to be large enough to hold their first ever grape treading ceremony. As a “townie”, it’s not the sort of thing I would have done in my youth and I suspect a fair few readers here have never trodden grapes either!

Continue reading “Treading the grapes in Greenford.”

As I noted before on July 9th, a seed mix containing Flax was planted in the meadow along the Capital ring path. Now, a mere two months later, its produced a fantastic display – and I think the best is yet to come. Do go visit this part of the park and have a look for yourself (its alongside the Capital Ring path).

Continue reading “A wonderful blush of blue in the park – and its only going to get better.”

On July 8th,  led by  Neil Anderson, we set out on a nature walk, taking in a large part of  Perivale Park.  Notes of what we saw, kindly provided by Neil, are shown below, along with some photos taken by myself.

Continue reading “Park nature walk – observations”

A dazzling variety of high-tech machines were used to prepare this year’s large park meadow for seeding. July is an unusual time to put seeds in, so quite what will happen over the next few months will be interesting to discover. The mix is for birds, and not neccessarily ornamental for humans to enjoy. But this years mix includes sunflowers (Helianthus annum) and cultivated flax (Linum Usitatissimum). The sunflower and flax seeds are 60% of the whole, so in about two years time we might expect a spectacular display of wonderful blue flax, as we saw two years ago in the orchard meadows.

Continue reading “The 2023 meadow seed mix goes in – Sunflowers and Flax!”

With all the talk of technologists and virtual and augmented reality, one sense is overlooked – that of smell.  And there is no more stunning scent than that of  Lady’s bedstraw (Galium Verum) drifting in a peaceful meadow at dusk.

Continue reading “Lady’s Bedstraw.”

When you take family to a park playground, you hope the kids will be safe and can run around happily without concern. We in fact visited Perivale park playground yesterday  (Friday) at around 14.00 with an infant grand-daughter. We did (sadly) have to check for broken glass and syringes (both of which have been seen there in the past), but at that time it was looking more or less tidy. I decided to visit the area again this morning, and you can see what I found from the photos below.

Continue reading “Is the park playground embarrassed?”

Each year, we normally have a nature walk close to or in the park. Recently these have been organised by the the Ealing Wildlife Group and this year,  there will be walk on Saturday July 8th. The meeting place will be on the bridge over the Brent, just past Coston’s nature reserve at 10.00, led by Neil Anderson. He tells me that “provided the weather is fine, the emphasis will most likely  be on flora & flying insects such as butterflies & dragonflies. Suspect it will be quiet for birds but I won’t ignore any we come across (Grey Wagtails successfully bred along the Costons Brook in the park).”

Continue reading “General nature walk, July 8th, 2023 at 10.00 led by Neil Anderson.”

Ealing parks will be putting down this year’s bird seed and wild flower mixes in the big meadow in the park, shown below.

Continue reading “News on meadow sowings – 2023.”

When the orchard garden project was being planned five years ago, four meadows were created with nutrient-poor soil to encourage a different diversity of flowers to adopt the area. The nutrient-free aspect was achieved by putting down a thick bed of sand into each of the meadows. These were then sown with a perennial seed-mix and planted with bulbs. Of the latter, the gladioli and some dwarf narcissus made a come back this year. So, now in June, what is happening?

Continue reading “The orchard meadows in June – Achillia and Viper’s bugloss.”

Nestling amongst the back gardens of Greenford centre and not far from Perivale Park is this wonderful little nature reserve.

Continue reading “The Litten Nature Reserve”

Yet another meadow to report on – full of cornflowers. Again, having been missing for a year or two, they have made a great comeback this year.

Continue reading “Cornflower meadow.”

The year 2023 is turning out to be a good one for both buttercups and poppies.  Here are some photos of our poppy meadow, part of the orchard garden, and our buttercup meadow, next to the tennis courts.

Continue reading “Meadows of poppies and buttercups.”

Herons are daily visitors to the park. One person has even suggested you can set your clock by one heron, who always visits Coston’s brook around 09.15 each day. This is a snap of possibly that heron, or another, with two friends, sent in by Ros. Thanks Ros!

Continue reading “Heron and Friends.”

Depending on how you define the park boundaries, we have four bridges – two crossing the Brent and two crossing Coston’s brook. A fifth is now taking shape, crossing what might be called Perivale Brook. This latter feeds the ponds in the area next to the children’s playground and previously crossed the path there in a pipe. A pipe that proved too small in diameter and was constantly blocking with leaves from the trees there. Now the pipe is being replaced by a custom built bridge.

Continue reading “A new river bridge in the park.”