Baking, Junior Baking, Edible Vehicles, Wooden Spoon, Dog show, fancy dress and seven legged race and don’t forget the strawberry Jam! More details here
Tickets and programmes are available at the Reception Garden, 155, Chevening Road.
Browse the programme here
The CAPS project has moved forward rapidly since our first posting. Brent has confirmed that they can let us use their big mobile monitoring machine either in July/August or later if we need time to agree a suitable site close to Salusbury Road. This machine measures NOX and particulate pollution from diesel by time of day. We will also hang small diffusion tubes on lampposts. The tubes record NOX only over a period.
Friends of the Earth (FOE) will help with a project in the autumn that involves children and parents. We are also liaising with Transition Town Kensal to Kilburn and Brent FOE. We have been pleased to learn that the new Mayor of London plans to launch a major consultation on combatting air pollution soon and that Brent will be consulting on a revised Air Quality Action Plan. When we have results from our monitoring project we expect to make recommendations for action by individuals, Brent, the Mayor and probably national government too.
The CAPS group met on 1st June with officers from Brent Council and national FOE in support. You can find a link to the notes of that meeting and more information about CAPS on our Environment Action Group page.
Fortunately the birds in the park were undeterred by overcast and windy weather that greeted the smaller than usual number of walkers that joined us on 21st May. The birds were active everywhere and altogether the five walkers spotted 17 species. It was good to see a pair of Blue Tits flying to and from a nest entered via a tiny hole in the soffit board above the café. Less surprising were another pair in a purpose-built suspended nest box in the woodland walk, close by a hole in a tree from which Parakeets were coming and going. The pitch and putt course yielded three handsome Mistle Thrushes, two Goldfinches and a Great Spotted Woodpecker which seemed to have been using the cut-off section of a newly pruned willow branch for drilling practice. Finally a quick recce of Chevening Road east produced the hoped for Swift. Here is a full list of the birds spotted.
| Name | Number |
| Blackbird | 4 male and female |
| Chaffinch | 4 |
| Crow | 4 |
| Goldfinch | 2 |
| Blackbird | 4 male and female |
| Chaffinch | 4 |
| Crow | 4 |
| Goldfinch | 2 |
| Gull, Herring (Black-Headed) | 2 |
| Magpie | 2 |
| Parakeet | 4 |
| Pigeon, Feral | Many |
| Pigeon, Wood | 1 |
| Robin | 2 |
| Starling | Many |
| Swift | 1 |
| Thrush, Mistle | 5 |
| Tit, Blue | 4 |
| Tit, Great | 2 |
| Woodpecker, Great Spotted | 1 female |
| Wren | 2 |
This year’s Queen’s Park Open Gardens and Studios Day is on Sunday, 19th June 2016.
Tickets and programmes will be on sale tomorrow at the Farmers Market and on 12th June. Find out more about the day and where to buy tickets on the Open Gardens page of our website.
CAPS – Combatting Air Pollution on Salusbury – is a new project for QPARA. With help from various environmental groups and the council – and hopefully with the involvement of local schools whose children’s health is daily put at risk – we hope to start by monitoring the levels of diesel pollution on Salusbury Road.
The CAPS team will be reporting back at our monthly meetings and we will post news of our progress on the front page of our website. You can read a background paper on the Environment Action Group page of our website.
Please contact us, if you can help and or want to become involved.
QPARA responded to Brent’s recent consultation on on-street parking and charges following a discussion between members at our May meeting. You can read the letter we sent to Brent here: Parking consultation QPARA response May 2016
Remember to keep 19th June clear for this year’s Open Gardens and Studios.
Please join us for a stroll through Queen’s Park and Paddington Cemetery. Meet at the park café at 9.30am. The walk will take about 90 minutes, but people can join or leave at any time. We will be looking out especially for Green and Great Spotted Woodpeckers and Swifts. Bring binoculars if you have them, but if not, just bring yourself!
Male Great Spotted Woodpecker
Our exclusive china mugs and environmentally friendly bags are on sale at Worldly Wicked and Wise and Queen's Park Books
