Local Wildlife Site

Wildlife

The brook is overhung for most of its length by narrow belts of woodland, with a good variety of trees and shrubs. Its water quality is fairly good, especially in the upper reaches. Darland's Lake is very shallow, with an extensive reedbed at the western end and a well-vegetated margin including brooklime and marsh marigold. This grades into boggy “carr” woodland of willows and alder. This is a scarce habitat in London, and it is even rarer to find wet woodland in active coppice management. There is also drier woodland of oak, hornbeam and horse chestnut. Other species here include several plants indicative of ancient woodland, including wild service-tree, yellow archangel, wood anemone, goldilocks buttercup and the rare plant, greater burnet-saxifrage. In damp grassland alongside the woodland there is a population of the nationally rare snake's-head fritillary, of unknown origin. The nature reserve has a diverse range of breeding birds, including reed bunting, hobby, sparrowhawk, jackdaw, stock dove, mandarin duck and a variety of common waterfowl. Eighteen species of mammals, including stoat and weasel, have been recorded. The site is also of value for grass snakes, amphibians, fungi and insects.

Facilities

Information (on signs).