Nature in Our Back Garden
Forget traveling to far away lands. Cancel your kibbutz down the Jordan River, postpone your summer safari in the Masai Mara and don’t even think about pitching a tent under the shelter of the Amazon rainforest – instead, just look out your back window. Nature offers us something that our bodies crave and that food, water and sleep can’t provide. It offers us a chance to connect with out planet and with creatures that have less complicated motives as humans.
London has a lot to offer nature-wise and not just the captive kind at the London Zoo but it is much closer to home that I find my connection to the planet. Many a time I’ve been washing the dishes, staring out of the back window when I’ve seen a skulk of foxes sneaking around the hedges between the trees or squirrels racing along the washing line. If you can overcome the initial urge to wonder if the cat is safe, just experiencing this in your back yard has a great reseting effect on our bodies.
If fox cubs aren’t your cup of tea, on any given day look up – you’ll probably see several species of warbler. From the reed warbler to the sedge warbler and the marsh warbler, they all live in the neighbourhood. It was the warbler that prompted me to buy a bird house and place a feeder with Kennedy Wild Bird Food.
Another local favourite for nature lovers that’s within our extended back yard is the South Norwood Country Park. This site was developed from a former sewage farm. There are a range of wildlife habitats, roughland, scrub, scattered trees, wet grasslands and a lake. The London Borough of Croydon has designated it as a local nature reserve and there is even running water in two streams that cross the site from the Albert Road end to Elmers End Road. If you haven’t already visited the South Norwood Country Park and you live in the area, this really is a must-see-soon. It also boasts a pond that encourages dragonflies and damselflies, and the site is home to 177 species, with 163 of them recorded since the park creation in 1989. The lake supports the common waterfowl found in parks and you shouldn’t be surprised if you see a Kingfisher.
So what are you waiting for? Look out your window, venture into the garden and maybe down the road to to the South Norwood Country Park.
Category: Local News and Sport
