Gores Marsh Park, Bristol

Over the last few years, we have worked with the Gores Marshalls and Bristol City Council on developing Gores Marsh. One a fairly featureless recreation ground, the park is now more marsh like, with accessible paths, a big dog free play area, wetland trees and beds of canary grass for children to explore. Our website (www.afla.co.uk) has photos of the park and a design history. For further information, please visit: http://www.afla.co.uk/CH/gores.html . 

Here is a video filmed today in the early morning light.

Blackthorn in the hedges, panic on the drawing board

The rate of change in the landscape this spring seems incredibly fast.  So fast, that my pencil and pen can barely keep up.  A few weeks ago, before the clocks changed, we enjoyed a trip down to the coast of Somerset, at the edge of the Quantocks.  Our journey from Bristol took us around the edge of the Mendips, still gripped by winter, and over the Levels, showing signs of spring.  Most striking was all the blossom on blackthorn (Prunus spinosa), contrasting nicely with lush new growth in the fields and the first bright green leaves of hawthorn.  White lambs gambolled across the meadows and swans patrolled the ditches between.  All so pleasing that I had to record in a sketch the essence of what I had seen.  With work committments and our madly hot weather, I have had barely time to finish the colouring as the blackthorn blossom, round here at least, is going past it's best.   Already the cherry blossom is out, amongst many other changes.  So much to see, draw and write about.  I may not be able to keep up.

Magnolia at Westonbirt Arboretum

We visited Westonbirt Arboretum last weekend, to enjoy the fine weather and meet up with friends blowing in from all four points of the compass.  Our previous visits have been in autumn, to admire the colourful leaves of the amazing maple collection.  Westonbirt is also a place to visit in Spring, as it is home to cherries, azalea and many fantastic magnolia trees.  The magnolia in flower are worth the entry price alone.  With sunshine and blue skies, the whole family were transported somewhere exotic and by the end of the day, we all felt as though we had been on holiday.  Relaxed and fulfilled.

Sustainable drainage at Knowle Park Primary

We are just about to start work on drainage and hard landscape design for a new play and allotment garden at Knowle Park Primary.  Last year we designed and obtained planning permission for the garden.  The ground has since been enclosed, slow worms excluded and the ground cleared.  We are now looking to drain the site into a series of planted rain gardens and a wildlife pond.  The photo of the model shows our intentions for the site.

School reading garden

We're currently working on a reading garden for our local primary school.  It's early days yet and the school is developing ideas with the school council.  To help the children visualise the space and play with ideas, we made a simple scale model.  We're looking forward to seeing what ideas the children have had and making them real.

Wood anemone at Park Copse

We visited the lovely River Chew at Compton Dando for a Mother's Day picnic.  The location is a favourite destination for many people, blessed as it is with tranquility, wildlife and scenery.  The river has trout, grayling, roach, dace, chub and millions of minnows.  They all feed on the mayfly that hatch later in spring.  In turn, the fish are eaten by otters that visit the valley.   The lush green pastures are home to plants like cuckoo flower (or lady's smock) and the diggingd of rabbit and badger are easy to spot in the banks.  We often see deer along the edge of the field and yesterday we followed two that fled across the river.   The children were excited to find fresh hoof prints in the river gravel.  They then spotted and collected many dark bones from drowned sheep and cattle, washed down into the river gravel.  The prize find was a cattle horn.

Above the river there is an ancient woodland called Park Copse and Peppershells Wood. It is filled with wildflowers and the first flower to show in spring is the delicate wood anemone, closely followed by wild garlic and bluebell. Whilst we lingered over our picnic, the children explored the wood and came back stinking of garlic.  In May, the valley is filled with the scent of the bluebells that carpet the woodland. Well worth a visit.

Ash poles for school ground project

My colleague Shaun and I recently prepared about 50 ash poles for Knowle Park Primary school, where we have created a natural building area, complete with a robinia framed eey-ore shelter.  The ash poles came from Arnos Vale Cemetery, courtesy of Nick Bull the landscape manager and were selected to be big enough to form a frame shelter but also heavy enough to dissuade children from mis-using the poles.

We removed all the side branches and smoothed out any sharp edges.  Hopefully, the children will now be able to make their own dens using natural materials rather than plastic stuff. The photo below is the eey-ore shelter frame, made by Children's Playground Company, out of robinia wood.

New Project section

We have just launched a 'New Project' portfolio section.  Visit our website for details of exciting and engaging schemes that we are currently working on:
http://www.afla.co.uk/NEW/broad.html

Wild daffodils

Is there a prettier sight in Spring than wild daffodils?
These were planted near the Mansion car park at Ashton Court Estate in Bristol.

Visit our website for details about the rose garden at Ashton Court, which also now shows video footage from this delightful enclosed space.
http://www.afla.co.uk/PA/ashton.html

Purdown – travelling back 1000 years through time, in half an hour

After visiting and surveying some Sustainable Home sites in Lockleaze, Bristol, my colleague and I walked over to Purdown, an open space managed by Bristol City Council. 

Purdown is a ridge of high ground that runs on a south-west to north east direction, from Eastville near Bristol’s centre out to Harry Stoke outside the city. It is a fascinating place to visit, with an unexpected wealth of history and wildlife.  As a ridge landform, it is an open space of at least two halves.  There are views to the North towards Horfield, Redland and Southmead, with the construction cranes rising above the new super hospital.  On the afternoon we visited, it was very quiet, with hardly any traffic noise.

However, travel just 100m over the ridge, and the noise of the M32 fills the air, even if the wind is at your back and blowing the noise away.   In compensation, the views on this side of the ridge are more interesting, taking in Frenchay & Stapleton (originally a Saxon village), Oldbury Court, the Dower House and associated 18^th century parkland that were originally part of the Forest of Kingswood.

More recent elements in the landscape include Second World War anti-aircraft gun emplacements – the legendary  ‘Purdown Percy’, which is now a scheduled ancient monument.  The adjacent housing estate was built in 1948.  The M32 was built between 1966 and 1975.  The BT telecoms tower, unusually built of concrete, was finished in 1970.  The triangular roof profile of the hospital at Southmead will form a new landmark. 

The ridge is covered in ancient woodland, scrub and grassland.  Stoke Park was recently acquired by the Council and scrub management has commenced over the semi-natural grassland (at least one indicator are the many anthills visible under the scrub).  I believe that cattle are to be introduced to control re-growth of the scrub. 

As a place to see evidence of how our city has changed, and continues to change, it is a fantastic place to visit.

Red kites

Last week I drove to Oxford for a project meeting and on the way I passed three red kites circling a dead badger on the road.  The red kite was re-introduced the Chilterns and are now spreading further afield.  I have now seen them on the outskirts of Swindon and hopefully we’ll see them scavenging over Bristol.  The red kite has a very distinctive tail and their graceful, often low level flight pattern makes them a wonderful addition to our landscape.  

Unwanted catches

We are on the cusp of spring.  The first green shoots are appearing in the hedges and under the woods, the snow drops are out and the birds are singing loud in the tree tops.  All of last year’s leaves have withered and died back, fallen to the floor, to reveal the bare bones of the landscape.  Now is the time to spot deer against the green shoots of wheat or notice stately homes through the bare trees.  Sadly, the bare earth also reveals litter and fishing debris along the river bank.  Not all rubbish is dropped by anglers – I find a lot of energy drink bottles downstream from Bath.  I now remove and recycle as much as I can carry on each trip.  Fishing line is retrieved where possible and binned after cutting into harmless bits.  I keep anything useful, such as floats, weights and lures.  Eventually, I hope to see the bank clean from plastic, though this will take time.

Snow

Our family enjoyed the recent snow as much as we could, though the children wished for more than the scant millimetres that covered our city.  On one of my regular site visits, I drove past the Marlborough Downs, a day or two after the snow fall.  Most of the snow had gone, except for north facing pockets and depressions high on the hills. Here the snow revealed subtle landforms that are normally too small to be seen from a distance.  I saw paths, plough lines, ancient hill forts, ditches and strip lynchets.  A day or so later, all the snow had melted and the downs returned to the grey green of winter grass.

Snow also reveals other things in the landscape.  A few days after passing the Downs, we headed to Norfolk for a winter holiday. As we drove east along the M4 and on to the M25, the snow fields re-appeared and we drove through a magical wintery landscape under a bright blue sky.  As we reached Essex, we noticed more and more wildlife in the fields, including many hares and partridges, silhouetted against the snow.  At Wangford Warren I spotted hundreds of rabbits in a single white field.  But on the way home a week later, the snow had melted and I failed to spot a single hare or rabbit along the same route.  The brown soil in ploughed fields and olive green of wintery grasslands provide perfect hiding places.