Kingston University Biodiversity Action Group

08-01-2015: Help! Your Ditch needs YOU!!!

We need your help on clearing ditches on 28 FEb 2015

We've had to cancel this event due to the forecast weather for the 10th of Jan.

Plans are afoot to rearrange this event for February.

Watch this space for further updates.

When: 28th Feb 2015
Where: Tolworth Court.
What: We will be clearing ditches at Tolworth Court .

!!Tea, Coffee and Biscuits are provided!!

Mini bus with 10 places can collect volunteers from Penrhyn Road at 9:45am - booking necessary to save your space on the bus.

Please email S.Sivanesan@kingston.ac.uk to reserve your space with your name, contact phone number (mobile preferably) and dietary requirements.

Thank you!

06-12-2014: Bish, (Rhodo) Bash, Bosh

Despite a frosty start on Saturday 6th of Dec, we had a really productive day clearing invasive rhododendron and laurel from Kingston Hill.

29-11-2014: woodland workshop at Kingston Hill

If you go down to the woods today you might be in for a bit of a surprise…

At the end of a fun day

Breaking news - 4 places are now available on a first come first served basis for the woodcraft work shop this Saturday at Kingston Hill from 10am-3pm.

If you can make it and are interested in learning to carve green wood -get in touch quickly to guarantee your place.

15-11-14: Pond…ering improvements at Kingston Hill

On Saturday we had our annual pond maintenance day at Kingston Hill. The pond is in a fairly good state after several years of work to remove aquatic and marshy vegetation which had covered all of the open water in the pond.

Getting ready to get our feet wet

11-11-2014: Riverfly Monitoring Round Two

Braving the predicted rains on Saturday, volunteers from Kingston Uni and the local community came together to learn how to monitor the state of a river using the wildlife indicators.

All (bar one) of the trainees on the second RMI course at KU

On Friday 17 October some of our Middle Mill eel trap monitors joined volunteers from other trap sites around London at the Natural History Museum (NHM) for the annual ZSL Eel Forum to discuss this season's results and plans for the future.

Welcome to your growing space

17-09-14: The Kingston Award

Recognition for volunteering!

One for the Kingston Students among you.

Establishing access all along the way

Things to do in 2014

New events in the new semester and testing testing 1 2 3…

Things to do for 2014

New events in the new semester and testing testing 1 2 3…

Things to do for 2014

New events in the new semester and testing testing 1 2 3…

June and July have been filled with even more Bees, Balsam, Bats and Butterflies as well as birds slow worms, voles and unidentified plants!

A slight delay in reporting on the last balsam bash, but there are a few upcoming events that I wanted to let everyone know about...read on to find out more.


Balsam Bashing Event Hogsmill River Wednesday 9th and/or Thursday 10th July 2014

On the lead up to World Environment Day, Dedicated students fromKingston University joined up to help clear Himalayan balsam Impatiens glandulifera – conducting a balsam bash on the banks of the Hogsmill River.

22-05-2014: International Day for Biological Diversity 2014!

Help celebrate the International Day for Biological Diversity. The focus for 2014 is Island Biodiversity.

Here are some interesting facts and figures about the importance of island biodiversity:

Headlines:

"One third of the world’s countries are islands"

"Islands constitute less than 5% of the Earth's landmass; yet, islands provide habitat for 20% of all bird, reptile and plant species"

"Islands also harbour more than 50% of the world’s known marine biodiversity"

"Islands have higher extinction rates then mainland areas due to the vulnerability of their endemic flora and fauna, combined with intensive human use of islands"

"64% of all recorded extinctions in the last century happened on islands"

16-05-2014: Of eels and algae

Wednesday was a day for exploring the river, the lovely weather had the clouds of insects flying over the Hogsmill and the surrounding bridges for the majority of the day and students out in force enjoying the weather.

Joe explains how to wrangle small eels for monitoring

09-05-2014: Meeting the Sopranos

Students, staff and local residents visited Seething Wells halls of residence on a bat walk with local ecologist Alison Fure from the London Bat Group to see what we might see and hear feeding in the skies around the halls on a Friday night.

Molly listens for bats through a detector

01-05-2014: Monitoring the Hogsmill with a little help from our riverine friends

We started April in the river planting up the new renaturalised bank by knights Park, and we've ended the month learning to monitor the state of the Hogsmill and the species in it with a little help from our riverine friends and the team at ZSL.

02-03-2014: Hogsmill River transformed into wetland wonderland!

Volunteers turned out in force to see the culmination of our Hogsmill habitat improvement project at our Knights Park campus. Today's task was to plant up the new riverbank areas with marginal plants ready to take advantage of the spring warmth.

Iaroslava cradles her little plant bundles of joy!

15/16/17-03-2014 : Riverbank building gets underway at the Hogsmill

The big weekend finally arrived - and what a three days it was! Blazing summer sunshine, crowds of eager volunteers and heaps of team spirit saw us through our huge task - to build up a riverbank area next to the concrete wall at Knights Park.

A happy gang at the Hogsmill work on the new riverbank structure

26-02-2014 : Dorich delights once again

We had a full class for this year's orchard maintenance afternoon at Dorich House with the London Orchard Project.

Lewis McNeil from the London Orchard Project enthuses about the need for healthy soil

24/25-02-2014 : Volunteers stake-out the River Hogsmill!

The poor weather of late magically (and thankfully!) relented to allow volunteers to enter the Hogsmill River and begin our biggest volunteer project to date - to renaturalise the River Hogsmill at our Knights Park campus.

Having a laugh in the River - who said hard work wasn't fun?!

Be part of the transformation at Knights Park!

Help increase habitat provision and enhance the riverside environment by signing up to help at our biggest biodiversity volunteer project yet!

Volunteers needed for Hogsmill Riverbank Creation!

25-01-2014 : Record breaking rhodo bash!

This, our final rhodo bash of the season turned out to be one of the biggest and best yet! An eager group of 31 volunteers from Kingston University, The Environment Trust, Marymount School and the local area put in 110% effort to beat the invasive shrub dominating our woodland.

Smiles all round - the rhodo bashing feel good factor is infectious!

11-01-2014 : Floods? What floods? Clear skies and clear ditches at Tolworth Court

With the recent torrential downpours, nothing could be more appropriate for volunteers to get stuck into than ditch restoration to help water drainage at Tolworth Court sports ground and enhance habitat.

Volunteers lined the ditch, forming a production line of efficient digging 'machines'!

Biodiversity events coming up

March 2018

Riverbank TLC: Wed 7 Mar @ Knights Park (13:30-16:00) Help us care for the river at Knights Park with the first litter pick of the riverbank and signage refresh of the season. Email by Mon 5 Mar to book your place.

Bramble Bash and other Woodland management: Sat 10 Mar @ Kingston Hill (10:00-16:30) Working with the Environment Trust, we'll be getting an area ship shape for tree planting in Autumn. Email by Wed 7 Mar to book your place.

Memorial Garden TLC: Fri 23 Mar @ Kingston Hill (13:30-16:00) Continuing our efforts to get plant seeds to grow our own flowers for the memorial garden this Spring. Email by Wed 21 Mar to book your place.

April 2018

Memorial Garden TLC: Wed 4 Apr @ Kingston Hill (13:30-16:00) Continuing our efforts to get plant seeds to grow our own flowers for the memorial garden this Spring. Email by Mon 2 Apr to book your place.

Green Woodwork craft day: Sat 7 Apr @ Kingston Hill (10:00-16:00) Learn some green woodworking skills at Kingston Hill Woodland. Email by Tuesday 3 Apr to book your place - SPACES LIMITED TO 10 PEOPLE. Over 18yrs only.

Memorial Garden TLC: Wed 18 Apr @ Kingston Hill (13:30-16:00) Continuing our efforts to get plant seeds to grow our own flowers for the memorial garden this Spring. Email by Mon 16 Apr to book your place.

Eel Monitoring Training 1 with ZSL: Wed 11 Apr @ Knights Park (14:00-16:00). Your first chance this year to get trained up to monitor eels on the Hogsmill River with the Zoological Society of London. Please note that you must be able to undertake 4 one hour monitoring sessions throughout the summer to attend. Email by Fri 6 Apr to book your place.

Riverfly Monitoring Training with ZSL: Sat 21 Apr @ Knights Park (11:00-16:00). Learn how to monitor the health of your local river using invertebrates. The survey techniques apply to all rivers in London. in exchange for free training, ZSL request that you commit to 6 monitoring surveys in your first year of surveying.
Email by Tues 17 Apr to book your place.

Sign up by emailing biodiversity@kingston.ac.uk

Other events from different groups:

The Lower Mole Project - run volunteer events throughout the year. Click on this link to go to their website for their latest events

Project Dirt (a network connecting and resourcing environmental and community projects) also advertise events and workshops in different locations - many in London well worth finding one near you.

Ongoing dates:

London Natural History Society events are free to members. A full list of events is available on their website.

What is KUBAG?

The Kingston University Biodiversity Action Group works within the University campuses and local area with the aims of improving green spaces for both wildlife and people.

We undertake practical conservation projects that aim to protect, enhance and create habitats for wildlife.

Check out our planned events for the 2016-2017 academic year

This blog is published by Sivi Sivanesan,

Biodiversity and Landscape Coordinator, Estates.

Kingston University Biodiversity Action Group - retired