Recent news

The Friends of Crofton and Sparrow Woods September 2021 e-newsletter is out now to all members. Join the group now to receive a copy and learn more about our wildlife and history, as well as forthcoming events.

Seen in Crofton Woods is one of the best known migrant butterflies - the painted lady.

It is a thistle lover, so well done to Work Group members in the Spring that cleared bramble to encourage the resurgence of thistles.

The Bromley RSPB Local Group walked through Crofton Woods this morning, and in addition to hearing the birdlife and seeing the buzzard nest, despite the drizzle, we also found a newly emerged purple hairstreak butterfly gradually enlarging and drying its wings. Wonderful colour.

The June 2021 Friends of Crofton and Sparrow Woods newsletter has been published - 6 pages of interesting news about this lovely area. Join the Group to receive your free copy.  

Use the Contact Us link, or fill in the membership form in the Form link and send it to us at friendscroftonandsparrowwoods@gmail.com

This is the time of year to keep your eyes open for speckled wood butterflies.They love Crofton & Sparrow Woods as sun dappled woodland glades are their favorite haunt. Don't look for them on flowers - they prefer honey-dew produced by aphids. They bask in sun spots with their wings half open.

It is vetch time of year again. Bush vetch (with a purple flower) and common vetch are doing well thanks to the warmth and rain. We hope that letting the grass grow in part of the Recreation Ground will see vetch return to that area too.

It is bluebell time of year at last. Bluebells are scattered all over the woods, but they are at their most beautiful in the south side of the woods, where they carpet the ground with a haze of blue. 

Three sessions of rubbish removal from the woods secured a mass of fly tipping - unwanted items consciously taken into the woods to dump. It is a real shame that the beautiful and scientifically important woods are despoiled in this manner. Well done to all the hard work of the Friends Group members and our Duke of Edinburgh scheme volunteer for sparing the time to make a difference, and to idverde for their support.

Good to see raptors are doing so well - although I am not sure that the very cross nesting crows agree.

Here are a couple of plants of cuckoo flower flowering on a Kyd Brook tributary stream bank, so named because of the time of year that it flowers is when cuckoos were heard. It has been a few years since cuckoos were heard in Crofton Woods.

The Friends of Crofton and Sparrow Woods turned out in force today for a socially distanced battle to cut back encroaching brambles and restore the only small area of natural meadow that is left. 

Don't worry, we have left plenty of brambles for blackberrying later in the year.

What was depressing was the amount of rubbish that has been brought into the area and dumped, so we had these filled bags to take away to the dump. 

Members of the Friends of Crofton and Sparrow Woods walk the same two circuits of the woods every week, and record the butterflies seen. Today is was Brimstones, Peacocks and Small Tortoiseshells. What butterflies have you seen in the woods?