How cool are we! Leonardo DiCaprio dropped in to our peregrine watch at the Tate Modern the other day. After viewing the birds on the chimney through our scopes, chatting with our volunteers and signing our Birds of Prey petition, he bought a couple of our soft toy calling peregrines before vanishing along the Southbank.
Our peregrine watch has also welcomed another three special visitors. Jasper den Dulk, his sister Beatrix and their friend Jasper Rance, raised £137 for our Birds of Prey campaign by selling their toys. They're all under the age of ten, so this selfless act deserves a proper face-to-face thank you, and where better to say a public thank-you than a site where peregrines live wild. They got some good views of one of the young peregrines, who posed on the chimney then flew off towards St Paul's Cathedral. Look out for their story on the BBC's Newsround web pages.
Our Date at the Tate continues until mid-September, so follow the example set by the great and the good and see the peregrines for yourselves. Signing our visitors book supports the campaign calling for existing laws to be enforced; protecting all birds of prey from illegal persecution.
Humble sparrows are also keeping us busy. We've sown special seed mixes on plots of land in public spaces across Greater London. The idea is to naturally restore food sources that we appear to have lost over the past couple of decades. Sparrows need insects (protein) when young and seeds (carbohydrate) when older, but don't wander far from their nest sites. It's this lazy approach to life that is threatening their future. Our grass and wildflower plots should help by providing both insects and seeds for them to eat, as well as looking great and bringing colour to many parks; like that shown on the right.
As part of the campaign to raise awareness of our vanishing sparrows, we're working with the Historic Royal Palaces to show-off a small colony of sparrows at the Tower of London. Sparrows are now quite rare in central London, so the Tower sparrows almost deserve the same protection and care as the Tower's Crown Jewels.
Sometimes it may seem that the only birds we're interested in here in London are peregrines, sparrows and swifts. We do focus on them a lot, but that's because simple actions can help support and protect them. London is in fact swimming in wildlife and we like to shout about that too.
Last Friday saw the award ceremony for our Mind the Bird photo competition. Hosted by Richard Parry, Interim Managing Director of London Underground, the event was held at Transport for London's Broadway HQ in Westminster. The standards were incredibly high and the range of birds proves how diverse London's wild bird population really is. You can still see the images on our Flickr site.