Last week, a 3m wide strip of the flower meadow in the park was seen being prepared. It runs alongside the meadow seeded with bird mix last year.
Continue reading “A strip of summer annual and perennial flowers is coming!”
Late spring colour along the River Brent
The walk along the river Brent from Longfield meadows/Gurnell centre to Greenford is delightful at this time of year.
Listening to birds.
I am certainly no expert on birdsong, and so have come to rely on technology (and any accompanying expert) to identify birds. Occasionally I will “listen” using the wonderful Merlin Bird ID app. Switched on today sitting on a bench near the largest lake in the Longfield meadows, eight different birds were identified after listening for around four minutes. A little further along the river Brent headed to Greenford another one was identified, making nine in all.
Perivale Park: One of London’s best outdoor spaces!
Back in 2018, we noted here the impending formation of a new National park based in London! This was the brainchild of Dan Raven-Ellison and now six years later, he has produced a guide to London’s best outdoor spaces where seven picks are listed. Amongst these is the “Best hidden gem: Section 8 of the Capital Ring”.
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Diversity in the Park orchard: A 2024 update.
Back in June 2021, a biodiversity survey of the park orchard meadows was carried out for us by Neil Anderson. Since then the meadows have largely been left alone, with no added nutrients and only a minimum of “weeding”. Time I thought to see what changes of three years of being left mostly to their own devices might have induced. Neil very kindly agree to repeat his survey for us and the results are included below.
Continue reading “Diversity in the Park orchard: A 2024 update.”
Litter picking with a Difference: CURB and Coston’s Brook
Coston’s brook is a tributary of the river Brent, emerging above ground in Perivale Park from a twin-tunnel culvert. The culvert is protected by a metal grill, and over time rubbish in the brook gets trapped on the grill.
Continue reading “Litter picking with a Difference: CURB and Coston’s Brook”
Now it’s the turn of the tulips – 2024.
Again in the orchard area in the raised beds.
Quince blossom in the orchard
In 2019, a fruit orchard was planted in the park. Of all the 24 trees there, one has really taken off – starting last year and literally blossoming abundantly this year – and that is the quince.
Updates – the park Fritillaries and the Colne Valley Viaduct.
Firstly the fritillaries, which are now looking splendid. Again, I think the bountiful rain this spring has helped!
Continue reading “Updates – the park Fritillaries and the Colne Valley Viaduct.”
Friends of Perivale Park: Annual report 2023-2024.
Each year, the Friends group holds an annual general meeting (AGM), at which the Chair presents a report of the year’s activities. This years was held yesterday.
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2024 – A good year for Daffodils.
Is it just me, or has anyone else noticed that each new season seems to especially favour some species of flower? This year, it seems to be magnolias, cherries and daffodils that are particularly splendid. Perivale park does not have any magnolias or cherries, but it certainly has a nice display of daffodils in the orchard area – thanks to volunteers who planted them last year.
A different view of the Park Pear Trees
Last autumn, the avenue of pear trees produced a wonderful orange-hued vista. Now a few months later, it is the turn of the blossom.
Wood sculptures found in a nearby nature reserve.
Whilst out exploring a nearby nature reserve, we came across these wonderful sculptures.
Continue reading “Wood sculptures found in a nearby nature reserve.”
The Ealing Beaver sanctuary revisited.
Time we thought to revisit the Beaver sanctuary, in Paradise fields. It has been raining a lot and so Coston’s Brook, which feeds the pond where the beavers are established should be and indeed was flowing well. The beavers themselves, which are largely nocturnal, are not expected to be out and about. So that they can be observed, there are a number of remote cameras, which capture their activities. There is a dam across the brook, but whether a “helping hand” from humans has contributed, or whether it is fully the work of the beavers themselves I am not certain.
Perivale Park Kestrel
You can often spot kestrels in the park, but less often taking a rest in a tree.
Friends of Perivale Park: Annual General Meeting, Monday 18th March, 2024 at 19.30.
Please Note. Due to a clash with an Ealing Council meeting on 5th March, the AGM has been rescheduled for Monday 19th March.
Fruit trees in West London – Lady Gilbert’s orchard.
Since 2019, Perivale park has had its own orchard, now with 35 fruit trees. I thought I might show some photos here of another, much older (1890) orchard which is about 13 km to the north of the park and is known as Gilbert’s orchard, after the wife of W. S. Gilbert of opera fame.
Continue reading “Fruit trees in West London – Lady Gilbert’s orchard.”
News for February, 2024 – every little helps!
A stroll around the park has revealed interesting new features for this year.
- A new rubbish bin in the Longfield meadows, next to the bench where you can admire the lakes. Every little helps – but hey Ealing parks, don’t stop there. Put a few more in!
- Two large swathes in the north Londfield meadow appear to have been seeded. I will try to find out what the mix is (two years ago they put yellow rattle in, but it did not germinate).
- The bulbs in the raised beds in the orchard are showing. It’s quite a selection we put in last year, so do pop by when the flowers start in a few weeks time.
- I could not resist showing the mahonia next to the storage container in the orchard. It’s been there for years, having been planted when the area was a bowling green. It is starting to look very nice this year.
Continue reading “News for February, 2024 – every little helps!”
Perivale Park Green flag: 2023-2024.
In 2022 the park got its first Green Flag award. We are proud that this award has been renewed for 2023 – 2024!
Costons Brook – as you may never have seen it before.
The water course that flows through the park, Costons Brook, is a tributary of the river Brent. Its source is difficult to identify since the development of Greenford these last 100 years or so have resulted in most of it running in underground culverts. The map I talked about here can help identify its original course, which appears to show one arm of the brook running close to Paradise fields, just west of Horsenden Hill.
Continue reading “Costons Brook – as you may never have seen it before.”
Places of interest in Google Maps for the park.
Google maps depends on crowd sourcing for items of interest on its maps (as indeed does the other map I often use, openstreetmap.org). I have been updating the entries for Perivale Park, the results of which you can see below. All you need is to have a Google account to do so, and although the entries are reviewed by Google, all of mine have thus far been accepted and released into the public version of the maps.
Continue reading “Places of interest in Google Maps for the park.”
The River Brent and (some of) its tributaries.
The river Brent flows along the southern edge of Perivale Park, on its way to joining the river Thames at Brentford. I thought here I would trace its route from (some) of its sources. The main route of the river starts in the London Borough of Barnet at Moat Mount, where it is called Dollis Brook. Much but not all of this route is walkable as the Dollis Valley Greenwalk.
Continue reading “The River Brent and (some of) its tributaries.”
A corner of the park is now restored!
Over the last few years, one corner of the main playing field area of the park had become something of a storage depot. Much of the accumulation was because of the loss of other storage spaces in the borough, and also whilst awaiting for completion of the new park at Glade lane. Gradually since June this year, the Perivale “depot” has been depleted and the contents moved to the new park. Finally the last items have gone and we now await for the grass to grow back to complete the recovery. So thanks Ealing Parks for doing this – it is much appreciated.
Unveiled: the new plans for Gurnell Leisure centre
Leisure centers apparently have life expectancies of ~40 years and the one named Gurnell, located in what we like to call the greater Perivale park in the late 1970s, had reached the end of its life. The original redevelopment plans, the “Gurnell redevelopment”, were rejected a year or so ago by the council planning committee and after a rethink a new team at Ealing Council has put forward what they call a very different set of proposals. A public meeting was held on 30th November to announce these plans to the public. Here I show a few of the posters and slides on show.
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Late autumn colour in 2023 – the avenue of Pear trees.
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.”
Autumn 2023 fungi, splashes of colour and gardening chores
Hunting for fungi is always great fun in the park – not for eating of course. Here are just a few we found over the last few days.
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Glade Lane canalside park – monumental mounds!
To the west of Perivale park are to be found Northala Fields, the prominent features of which are the four tall mounds with two outstanding viewpoints at their tops. Now to the south west of Perivale an even larger feature is taking shape- Glade lane canalside park.
Continue reading “Glade Lane canalside park – monumental mounds!”
Overgrown path now clear – thanks to local volunteers.
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.”
The meadow in autumn 2023.
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.
The beavers are coming – real soon now!
Perivale park is blessed with having lots of green interesting areas surrounding it and one of them is Paradise Fields, just up to the road so to speak. There a project to introduce beavers is taking place (around five), following the earlier such project at Enfield and the birth of the first baby beavers in London in 400 years there.