Bats for the Sydenham Arts - Artists' Trail

 Friends of Mayow Park organise occasional bat walks at dusk and we have experienced excitement at seeing these flying mammals.

But never before have we had the joy of unusual bat visitors hanging out in the park for weeks at a time.

If you have visited Mayow Park recently you should have spotted some of these multi-coloured ceramic bats and wondered how they got there. 

They are the work of ceramic artist Elena Howard. 

Elena created a bat hunt, encouraging park users to search around the park to see how many colourful bats they can spot. And that's not all - she  created characters and stories for some of the bats and a competition inviting people to be creative on a batty theme.

Although some of these bats went absent without leave shortly after arriving, most have stayed and seem quite content in their green space home. All ages have been able to enjoy the hunt. 

The competition has now finished and Elena has chosen winners who will each receive their own unique ceramic bat. As the bats have taken up permanent residence in the park, do visit and say hello to any that you find.

All photos by Elena Howard. To find out more visit:  https://www.elenahoward.com/    

The GoodGymmers came to mulch 29 August 2023

You don't expect volunteers to run to an orchard and spend 45 minutes on weeding and mulching on an evening during the working week.... and then run off again.  But that is just what eleven members of Bromley GoodGym did when they visited Mayow Park orchard for an evening session. 

They showed such amazing team work and the trees enjoyed the attention.

In no time some members were removing tree guards and pulling up weeds, while others went off to fill two wheel barrows full of  wood chips to mulch round the base of trees.

In 45 minutes they took care of SIX trees. That's fast work.

Why bother to mulch round the fruit trees with wood chips?  Here are some good reasons:

• The wood chips encourage mycorrhizal fungi to grow- beneficial fungi that live in the wood chips and work with the tree roots. They take sugars from the tree and give nutrients back from the soil . . . how cool is that?
• Wood chip mulch holds moisture in the soil round tree roots so there is less need to water, particularly good in summer
• The wood chips slow down water into the soil particularly after heavy rains, so the tree roots are not sitting in wet
• They protect plant roots from extreme cold in winter
• They protect plant roots from too much heat in summer
• As they rot down they help improve the soil

All photos are from BromleyGoodGym. Thank you for your help.

BATS IN THE NIGHT 21 April 2023

Outdoor events can cause weather worries for organisers, commonly ‘will the weather force us to cancel?’.

But a bat walk must factor in the needs of bats too; they are not keen on inclement weather. They prefer mild, still evenings with plenty of flying insects for supper.

Friday 21^st April began very wet and cold. Should we cancel the event? 

The BBC and the Met Office offered assurances for brighter weather by the late afternoon. And that is how it turned out.

The weather improved rapidly. By 8pm when people started to gather at Mayow Park, it was a still evening with clear sky, full of flying treats for bats. 

The meeting point

Iain's intro

     Using a bat detector

Dr Iain Boulton opened the event with some entertaining batty facts. He certainly knows his bats. He brought some bat detectors to lend out to walk attendees, showing us how to set them to around 50 kHz, the frequency for the pipistrelle bats we would hear or see in Mayow Park. The detectors, not much bigger than a mobile phone, catch the sounds made by bats flying above our heads and translate those sounds at a level that humans can hear.

Even before we started the walk, at least one bat was detected between the pavilion and guardian oak tree which stands majestically at the park gates.

Walking slowly in the park, first in half-light then dusk, with the trees standing as silhouettes against the fading light, children moving with torches, an occasional bird flying past and all the time listening for the bats: this is a magical, calming sensation.

                                                                on the walk

The pipistrelles flew out for us at three locations along the south side of the park, along the path between Mayow Road an Recreation Road, while Venus shone down on us from high in the night sky.

A lovely evening. Thank you to all who joined us and to Iain for leading us.

TOTAL ATTENDING 52 + walk leader

36 adults + 12 children + 4 volunteers + Dr Iain Boulton, our walk leader

All photos courtesy of Pippa Moss

Mayow Park - photos by D Roberts

 A range of photos showing a variety of interesting topics in Mayow Park

meadow flowers

parakeets pairing up

a solitary parakeet

pine cone

greenery with dandelion

shades of green

general view

autumn leaves

busy park

Orchard winter pruning workshop

Organised and facilitated by members of our own Friends of Mayow Park (FOMP) group, we ran two workshops  in Mayow Park's community orchard (near the tennis courts) on 24th and 28th February 2023.  

Five people attended session one and six attended session two - eleven people in total.

Both sessions began with a short intro on  tools for pruning and how to look after them. Next came 'getting to know your tree' by looking for damaged, dead and diseased branches on the trees. We talked about  the process of grafting scions, different rootstocks and reasons for mulching.

After the brief theory intro we visited some trees to look carefully at what should be pruned and why.

Then on to the practical pruning, in pairs.   

One of the  FOMP members worked on weeding round the trees and collecting  mulch to lay around each tree.

The two hour sessions did not give us enough time for all the trees but those we worked on seemed very contented after.

Our regular orchard volunteers will continue pruning and mulching over the next two weeks.

Equipment at the ready

choosing which branch to cut

Loppers  being moved to cutting position

A clean cut with sharp loppers

A few trees are not in the best of health. One apple tree has had fungal canker for a few years but seems to be healing some of the wounds this disease caused.

Canker on Crawley Beauty

Unfortunately the Conference pear tree has never thrived. It turns out it has been planted where the ground gets rather water-logged after heavy rain. Now its main trunk is being eaten alive by wood borers.

Any ideas about the creatures causing this damage?

Soon all the fruit trees will have a blanket of wonderful mulch to keep them cosy in winter, cooler in the heat of summer and encourage mycorrhizal fungi that work in symbiosis with the roots of the trees, swapping nutrients and sugars.

cosy comfort of woody mulch

New fox-proof bins

SIX new Broxap plastic litter bins were installed in Mayow Park last week to replace the worst of the deteriorating metal bins. They were funded from Lewisham's Greening Fund that parks and green spaces groups could apply for last year. The rest of the bins to be replaced will have to wait for the next funding round.

One of the new bins

A cold and frosty morning

A crispy, frost-filled view across Mayow Park on 21st January 2023 at 8.42am from the north-east side.

All photos Credit: John Roussety

Sunrise

Dramatic view