London welcomes three new peregrine chicks. Proud parents Misty and Bert have been seen feeding their young on the deep ledge they call home in the heart of the Capital.
The site is extremely hard to reach and nearly impossible to view. When one of our monitors poked his head above the parapet to see how they were doing, the message behind Misty's aggressive screech was clear - GO AWAY! He didn't get to see the chicks but yesterday, someone else did and they've recorded three healthy juveniles.
Another couple of weeks and they'll be taking to the skies, learning how to swoop, soar and dive. How to play, chase and hunt for food. This is a special time because it means we get to see the world's fastest creatures strut their stuff in the sky over St Paul's Cathedral and the River Thames; where food is plentiful. They love pigeons.
Another month and they'll be returning to their favourite hang-out, the Tate Modern's 100 metre tall chimney. Think of these peregrines as the trainee hoodies of the bird world. The Tate chimney is the equivalent of a sulky teenager's bus shelter; the place where they hang-out to pass time. This gives us a unique opportunity to share their lives and we'll be setting out our telescopes and display to point these magnificent birds out to passers-by on the Southbank.
News of the confirmed sighting came as I joined two classes of children from Surrey Square Infants on a field trip to a scrap of land in the middle of Southwark's Aylesbury Estate. In a couple of weeks time we'll be helping to transform this scrap of overgrown buddleia, bramble and nettles into a wildlife area where residents can relax and de-stress in a quiet oasis, removed from the busy and noisy Old Kent Road.
With the children's help we spotted ten different bird species, including greenfinch and swifts. The area used to be great for starlings and swifts but refurbishment work on the old brick council flats unwittingly removed the nooks and crannies where they used to live. Some residents have put up nestboxes and we were lucky to see a pair of blue tits using one of them. I'm told swifts have been seen darting into the old iron grilled air vents too! House sparrows were rare but there was a robin, wren, numerous blackbirds and enough pigeons to keep Misty, Bert and their three young chicks in food for a week.
School staff were surprised we'd seen so many different species on such a small patch of land. I'm sure with a bit of a tweak we could do better and maybe attract more sparrows. We won't be turning it into a manicured park. It will remain a wilderness but with a few more plant varieties, some bug and bird boxes, maybe something for bats and plenty of wildflowers. In short, it will become a mini nature reserve to suit its surroundings. You'll be able to follow progress on BBC London as part of their SpringWatch Action Team [SWAT] project.
If you think that's amazing, take a look at ThamesWatch - another project designed to get people to look at wildlife, but this time focusing on the River Thames. So, when the hurly burly's done and the battle's lost and won, you may well find me on the Aylesbury Estate, or on the Southbank, or somewhere else along the Thames. I'll be the one de-stressing, marvelling at the world around me and the vast range of creatures that share it with us.