On May 4th we held our Spring event, ‘Dawn to Dusk’, including a 5am Dawn Chorus walk, with twenty-six bird species identified.

Our stalls and exhibits in the Meadows were well-attended, the plastic duck races in the River Rea also popular with children. Mary Green led a botanical walk, and river-dipping with nets and trays enabled visitors to find some tiny invertebrates that live in the river.

Over thirty adults and children attended the Bat walk in the evening, led by Chris Sherlock of BrumBats; using detectors near the lake we identified Pipistrelle, Daubenton and Noctule species.

Our Photo competition … won by Dylan Read, age 16, currently studying GCSE photography at St Thomas Aquinas School.

The judges liked his close-up of withered bramble leaves - an ordinary subject, well observed, given new interest by the backlit effect and shallow focus.