Garthorne Road Nature Reserve Open Days 2023
Reserve Open Day
Saturday 21th August
2 – 5 pm
No pre-booking required
The Friends of Garthorne Road Nature Reserve are once again opening up the reserve for the public. Come and explore this quiet wildlife oasis bring a picnic and do the tree trail or mini beast hunt.
Suggested donation £2
We are co-vid safe but please wear a mask if queuing occurs and keep your distance from other visitors
Are you interested in helping out?. We have regular workdays to maintain the reserve ranging from cutting the paths to controlling invasive species and building dead hedges for mammals
2nd Saturday of each month, ours next one is:
11th September
16th October
We open the reserve to the public from April to October and are looking for volunteers to help us?.
PLEASE DO NOT ATTEND IF YOU HAVE SYMPTOMS OF COVID-19
Hand sanitiser will be available
We will be maintaining a 2m distance at all times.
| Garthorne Road Nature Reserve it totally run and maintained by volunteers in partnership with Lewisham Council, are you interested in getting involved in the Friends of Garthorne Road Nature Reserve (FoGNNR) volunteering as a committee member or assist in managing the reserve on the monthly workdays which are either on a Saturday or Sunday you can stay for as little or the whole day as you wish? garthorneroadnaturereserve.com/about/ |
Nature’s Gym workday at Garthorne Road
The Nature’s Gym spent a happy few hours in Garthorne Road last week (18th August 2016), creating butterfly scallops in the woodland. Even as we were working we saw meadow browns and large whites and a few others that refused to keep still, so we couldn’t identify them. This is an on going management plan and hopefully will result in more butterflies and with any luck some flora. We did uncover some purple loosestrife and rosebay willow herb, and I think there may be a number of other dormant plants just waiting to be uncovered!
Why create scallops?
Woodlands are fantastic habitats for wildlife and including the 40 species of British butterfly. Open space is the most important part of a woodland for butterflies, especially on its edge habitat where the warmest conditions are to be found. Many woodlands have lost this vital habitat, but they are easy to recreate. The best woodland edges support a varied habitat structure. Cutting scallops creates a varied, zoned edge structure and also reduce shading along the adjacent ride and have great potential to improve any existing ride side butterfly habitat. They will increase the overall structural diversity of the woodland and provide sheltered herb-rich grassy areas.
We have followed the ‘Linear Cutting Regime’ with offset scallops) – which creates a far more varied habitat. For more information on scallops and why they are a great way to create new habitats, you might find this leaflet from The Butterfly Conservation Trust useful.
(Lots more information can be found on the Butterfly Conservation Trust website)
Other wildlife found in Garthorne Road
Garthorne Road Nature Reserve 