GET INVOLVED

We have a schedule of events for the year ahead. Join us on one of our practical days which offer the chance to learn new skills and get your hands dirty doing conservation tasks. Come and learn more about species in the park on our wildlife walks or become part of the Friends Committee which meets to discuss the functioning of the group.

FoSNCP hold a practical workday on the second and fourth Saturdays of the month and every Tuesday morning and/or afternoon to undertake conservation projects within the park.

At present we’re meeting at the council compound – the locked gates right by the tramline, on the vehicle access road at 10 AM. We usually finish around midday and enjoy a hot drink & biscuits.

Training and tools are provided. Please wear clothes suitable for outdoor activity and the weather, bring your own gloves if you have them.

We recommend sturdy footwear. Activities are subject to change at short notice.

If you would like to register to join us, please contact us by email – friendsofsncp@gmail.com. We can then let you know if we can offer you a space on one of the workdays.

WORKDAYS 2025

For previous years – see the archive!

11th January 2025

Our first workday of 2025 was very cold and frosty but beautiful blue skies made it a perfect winter’s day. Our task today was to clear away brambles and vegetation to uncover the primroses already beginning to show their heads. This lovely early spring display can be seen around the small woodland at the bottom of the mound. It’s a delicate process to ensure we don’t damage the primrose shoots when removing the brambles but important to let light into this area to aid their growth. The arisings were gathered up and added to the habitat bank which we created last year behind the woodland. Looking forward to seeing the fruits (or primroses) of our labour in a few weeks time.

25th January 2025

This Saturday’s workday and the previous Tuesday’s  (21st) concentrated on getting as much of the blackthorn cut back as possible in preparation for February’s hedge laying tasks. This winter, our reports have detailed the reasons for, and the location of, this conservation work. We have finally got to a stage where most of the planned clearance has been done. We have been processing the arisings so that we have material suitable for making a dead hedge. Some of the thicker blackthorn branches have been set aside for stakes which we will use to make the dead hedges.

8th February 2025

A damp and drizzly morning saw us make a short walk to our work site on the slope of the mound. This is an annual task for us to clear brambles to let in light and space to give the wildflowers a chance to flourish in the spring. The slope on the tram track side of the mound tends to get the most sun. Cowslips tend to dominate the area but other wildflowers such as primroses used to thrive in the sunny conditions. The primroses have all but disappeared these days so Ian’s plan is for us to plant some wildflower plugs in the future to try and bring back a variety. We filled ‘grab bags’ with the bramble arisings and dragged them back to the compound to add to the compost heap. A good morning’s work but we’ll need to return on another workday to finish it.

22nd February 2025

8th March 2025

The other team had a much shorter walk from the compound to the environment garden and a small copse of hazel trees. We use hazel a lot in our nature reserve primarily for stakes and are currently using it in our hedge laying. Usually sourced from other Croydon sites such as King’s Wood, it’s an advantage if we can utilise what we have on site in SNCP. This small copse was previously coppiced some years ago and is now ready to be cut back again. We had to remove quite a lot of brambles to get to the copse but once in, we coppiced the hazel setting aside stems of about 5ft 6″ in height and a suitable thickness for stakes. These stakes will be used on Tuesday’s workday to help complete the hedge laying along the seasonal path. The rest of the brash from the coppiced branches was laid into neat habitat piles.

11th March 2025

Following on from Saturday’s workday, our smaller group of volunteers headed to the blackthorn copse next to La Motes meadow. A couple of volunteers used an axe to put points on the hazel stakes coppiced from the environment garden and then helped Ian to drive them into the ground where the hedge is being laid. Then a couple more volunteers weaved hazel binders between the stakes. Everyone took turns to continue the work of Saturday’s volunteers and make habitat piles with the brash from the coppiced blackthorn.

12th April 2025

10th May 2025

20th May 2025

Newly-planted trees in SNCP need a lot of after-care to allow them to thrive without being overwhelmed by scrub and weeds. In addition, our previous hot and dry summers have meant many volunteer hours watering them. To help, the Friends purchased a load of mulch which we distributed around young trees along the seasonal path as well as around the pleached stems where this year’s hedge has been laid. We were very grateful to a corporate group of young volunteers who had transported the many barrow loads of mulch to the site the previous week.

24th May 2025

The cemetery path is a narrow, winding path that runs alongside the stream adjacent to the cemetery from the Harrington Road entrance and coming out of the woodland near Elmers End Road. It isn’t one of the main paths although quite well used once discovered but does get very overgrown particularly with nettles. It also forms part of the Friends’ butterfly transect route so it’s important to maintain it. TCV were working in SNCP this week so they started work along the path and FoSNCP volunteers finished it off during today’s workday. We used a mixture of scythes and shears to clear about a metre of soft vegetation either side of the narrow path. Ian also used his brush cutter with two volunteers keeping a safe distance behind to rake away cuttings and warn him of any path users coming near.

14th June 2025

28th June 2025

The middle of a heatwave is not the best time for a workday in SNCP but those newly-planted trees won’t survive without a bit of TLC and water. We headed towards the Friends’ Plantation  near the cemetery path – so-called by our warden, Ian, since we’ve been planting trees here over the last 10 years. The aim is to extend the woodland from the Elmers End corner with native species and it is really maturing and starting to be recognisable as a woodland. The most recent whips were planted by a corporate team of volunteers. Aftercare by FoSNCP volunteers involves clearing a ‘halo’ around the trees large enough to help prevent vegetation suffocating them. We’ve recently starting mulching around them too to lock in moisture and contain weeds. Lastly, and arguably the most important job given the current heat, is to water them. This is no mean feat given the water hogs need filling from the tap in the kiosk and then pulled to the site and poured into buckets and watering cans. No wonder one of our volunteers can be seen topping up her own water levels. Phew!

8th and 12th July 2025

26th and 29th July 2025

5th and 9th August 2025

The newly-installed platform 3 has been our focus for the last two workdays. Cutting back vegetation and overhanging branches from around the platform improves both sight lines and the general vista around the lake. Over the years since this platform fell into disrepair, it became more and more hidden from view. The added advantage of cutting back the vegetation is that it is now more visible from other viewpoints around the lake. There is still more work to be done but the view from platform 3 looking over to platforms 2 and 4 and vice versa are much improved. The cuttings were used to improve and build up an existing dead hedge along the path down to the platform. 

23rd August 2025

Ian was having a well-earned day off today but he’d left us clear instructions on what to do in his absence. Armed with pole saws, requisite hard hats and other tools for sawing and lopping branches, we headed for one of the paths not too far from the car park side. It made a nice change to have a shorter walk there and back than some of our recent workdays. As with many of the paths in our nature reserve, the Council contractors need easy uninhibited access to get their tractors down to mow the edges. Any large overhanging branches block their way so it was our job to remove them. Pole saws were needed to cut back the taller branches with some of us using loppers to cut these down into smaller pieces that rot down more quickly. Silky saws came in handy for those thicker but low hanging branches. 

3rd September 2025

9th September 2025

On a lovely early autumn morning, we were tasked with uncovering the channel running through the wetlands. Some years ago, a pipe was installed to divert water from the Chaffinch Brook into the wetlands. A channel branching off in a couple of directions was dug to allow the water to flow into specific areas. Although we did a lot of clearing work in the wetlands last year, we didn’t get as far as the brook where the pipe enters. The channel has become quite blocked with fallen leaves and other soft vegetation. It was hard work clearing a foot or two either side of the channel but the results were rewarding. Still more work to be done in this area but a good start.

13th and 16th September 2025

27th September 2025

11th October 2025

As Ian was on annual leave, he left us instructions to carry out tasks along the path that runs next to Ryeland’s Field. This path is not only regularly used by park visitors but Council vehicles need to get through for mowing or emptying bins. Overhanging branches can inhibit these activities so Ian needed us to do some crown raising of the trees along the path. This involves using pole saws to cut back the lower branches to the trunk to lift the height of the tree canopy. In Ian’s absence, it was up to Sundeep to demonstrate to volunteers the use of the pole saw and how to make undercuts to minimise the risk of splitting the branches. The sawn branches were then cut up into smaller pieces and made into habitat piles to provide shelter and food for invertebrates and other smaller wildlife.

18th October 2025

25th October 2025

Last year, a lot of work was done to clear the pool in the wetlands of yellow flag iris. A beautiful plant when in flower, it is a good habitat for insects but can be invasive if left uncontrolled. Although the yellow flag iris in the pond is now under control, some annual clearing needs to be done to keep it this way. Waders were needed for this task as well as good balance when pulling out the plant if we didn’t want to take an unexpected plunge! We concentrated on pulling the iris from the section visible from the path so park users have a good view of the wildlife on the pond. We then dragged the iris across the water and pulled it onto the bank to rot down.

4th November 2025

8th November 2025

11th November 2025

Tuesday 18th November 2025

22nd November 2025

13th December 2025

For today’s workday, we began work on this year’s section of blackthorn next to La Motes meadow. As explained in previous workday reports, we are coppicing the blackthorn here in sections on a 3/4 year rotational cycle. The aim is to improve the habitat for the Brown Hairstreak butterfly. Ian has surveyed the young blackthorn for eggs here and in other sections of the park. So far, he has counted almost 300 eggs and marked the stems with tape so we know not to coppice these. They are mostly found along the outer blackthorn bushes and are easier to find in the winter once the leaves have fallen. Blackthorn cuttings take a lot of processing because of the spiky branches. Once this has been done we can make habitat piles or add them to the dead hedge we made behind the laid hedge.

16th December 2025

Our last workday for 2025 involved tree planting. We have been given native Hazel and Hornbeam whips by CPRE London. Ian’s plan is to create coppices which will eventually provide material for us to use around SNCP for laying hedges and making fences. The location of the coppices is alongside Ryelands field. Ian demonstrated how to prepare the hole for the whip, plant it, support it with a thin stake and protect it from nibbling voles with a small tube. The whip will grow into a tree over the next 7 – 10 years before being coppiced. This involves cutting the tree down to its base (stool) which will then re-grow and produce many stems from the stool which can be used for stakes and binders. This process of coppicing will continue on a rotational basis every few years. Today was just the start of the tree planting which will continue throughout the winter.