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The chicks are here

4/29/2018

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One of the great events in the annual cycle of life in our garden is the arrival of a pair of Canada Geese in March. We don't know if its the same pair every year but they seem to see our garden as their home. Usually, sometime in mid April they disappear for a few days, or we just see one of them. Then they reappear with a bunch of 5 or 6 chicks in tow. This year the first appearance was yesterday when proud mum and dad showed off their five chicks - enjoy.. 

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First steps towards making a habitat map

4/25/2018

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Two weeks ago I discovered a fantastic citizen science project organised by Cornell University called Habitat Network

Its aim is to encourage people and communities to make maps of their gardens to show the diversity of habitats for plants and animals.

Todate over 30,000 sites have been mapped in the USA. But the project is open to anyone and the online habitat mapping tool they provide can be used by anyone anywhere in the world.

I loved the idea.. As a former geologist I love maps and I love making maps. There is something about making or using them that stimulates my imagination. They force us to interpret the symbols, colours and codes in the map image to make something meaningful. They also provide us with a big picture synthesising lots of information which our imagination can assimilate and use.

So I have made my initial habitat map using the tool and over the next few months I will add detail to it as I discover more about my garden.
HABITAT NETWORK
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Surrey Living Landscape
My personal project connects to Surrey Wildlife Trust's living landscape project which aims to support and increase the biodiversity of the countryside in my county. The trust supports a number of conservation projects and their key idea is to link these conservation sites along corridors that facilitate the movement of species.

The strategy developed by the SWT enables me to locate my project within a community project to sustain the landscape I inhabit.
a_living_landscape_for_surrey_low_res.pdf
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sywt_living_landscape_strategy_2014.pdf
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Spring flowers

4/21/2018

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Another warm spring day and a walk around the garden to reveal some little gems- all self-seeded and growing without any hep from me. All they want from me is to be recognised, appreciated and enjoyed.
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Early days of spring

4/20/2018

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Looking at the photos on her phone,my wife suddenly remarked that the Canada Goose chicks had arrived this time last year. The Canada Geese have returned, as they do every year, but so far there are no chicks and I just saw the pair of them in the garden so they are clearly not nesting at the moment. While the annual cycle of life continues each year the details of how life unfolds are different.

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Its another beautiful spring morning.I took a walk around my garden and saw the bluebells in the woods for the first time this year. When they are fully opened in May they form a deep carpet on the north side of the wood. For now there are just a few flowers open. They are a sure sign that spring is here.

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My Garden Notebook

4/19/2018

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It's mid April and we are enjoying some warm weather at last and spring is arriving fast. For an Englishman its the most important time of the year: full of hope and renewal. So Inspired by my uplifted spirits I have decided to start a new blog which will record my observations and interactions with my garden.

Commitment like this usually comes from the confluence of several things and this week several things happened to inspire me to turn long held thoughts into productive action. Firstly, I am trying to encourage my daughter who is interested in ecology to appreciate the natural ecosystems we have right in front of us. I was once a practising geologist and I know the value of field work in inspiring deeper engagement and imagination to understand what the natural world provides. I figured that by keeping a notebook and making it public my daughter might share her scientific knowledge of how to study natural ecosystems with me and perhaps contribute a post of her own from time to time. Well thats my hope.

Secondly, I discovered a wonderful citizens science project led by Cornell University, which aims to encourage ordinary people like me to literally map my back yard. Their mapping tool which I will share in a future post inspired me to begin creating a habitat map of my own back yard and to invest time and enargy in understanding it. I talked about this tool with my daughter on a walk we made and she seemed interested in it and the idea we might collaborate in studying our garden.

Thirdly, I started reading a book called 'The private Life of an English Field MEADOWLAND by John Lewis-Stempel. Its a beautifully written book and I imagined the pleasure John gained from trying to read the everyday life of his field and then share his understandings through his writings. I thought I might try something similar in my blog.

Fourthly, and to relate this project to my educational work, I have become deeply interested in the idea of learning ecologies and the idea of ecology and ecosystems seems to me to hold huge potential for understanding how and why we learn and practice. I sense that devoting time to study myself in my environment with all the life and drama it holds can only benefit my educational idea and theory making.

So these are the most important reaons for embarking on this project, now all I have to do is do it!
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In Meadowland: The Private Life of an English Field, John Lewis-Stempel charts a year in the life of a field on his farm on the Herefordshire border. If you're thinking that sounds like it could be a claustrophobic or dull experience, put such ideas out of your mind immediately. Books have been written about entire countries that contain a less interesting cast of characters than Lewis-Stempel's account of one field on the edge of Wales. Foxes, red kites and voles become as intricately shaded as characters in an HBO drama, the readers' sympathies swinging between them and their adversaries. ​Guardian Review
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    Garden Notes
    ​#gardennotes

    My garden keeps me busy and it gives me the exercise I need to keep fit. It also gives me a lot of pleasure and happiness. It enables me to express myself creatively and draws my attention to the beauty and ecology of life. In this blog  I am telling the story of my garden and my involvement in it through photos, movies, paintings and other artefacts that it inspires me to create. 

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    Useful Links
    Wildlife Garden Forum
    Surrey Wildlife Trust 
    Habitat Network
    Plant Identification UK




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