We want to know what species are present in our parish and where they are. To find out, we will be doing some organised surveys, but also we want to encourage everyone to record what they see.
We have chosen 20 species that we are especially interested in knowing more about and we are making the reporting of these as easy as possible.
We are offering two methods for reporting sightings. The easiest, which can be used for our ’20 Selected Species’ is via our website form below
The other method is via iRecord which requires more detail but goes directly to a national biological recording system that we can retrieve data from - but you’ll need to add our activity code when you fill in the form.
events & surveys
Images courtesy of Simon Booker stokerpix.com
events & surveys
We'll use this page, as well as our Facebook group, to advertise our upcoming events and surveys.
Everyone is welcome to join our events, we hope to see you there!
Events
SSWCG wildflower growalong
We are looking for volunteers to grow wildflower plugs for planting out in verges around the village, to improve the biodiversity and help our pollinators - and also because they look good!
It's fun, and simple to do. We will provide the seeds and seed and plug trays in March, together with full instructions and ongoing advice.
We did this in 2021 and it was a great success! We had about 12 growers, some of them complete novices and we produced more than 1600 plants, which volunteers planted out in October 2021. Many of these are now becoming established around the village.
We have an interesting list of species to grow this year; the trays are about 30 x 54 cm and contain 84 plugs.
Please could anyone who wishes to take part in 2023 let us know by emailing contact@southstokewildlife.org as soon as possible. It would be helpful if you could let us know whether you have any experience and how many trays you could accommodate (we will allocate the easier species to those with less experience, unless you want a challenge!)
Spring BioBlitz
What is a BioBlitz?
It is an event that focuses on finding and identifying as many species as possible in a specific area over a short period of time. At a BioBlitz community members work together to get a snapshot of an area’s biodiversity. We will take photographs of everything we find to enable identification and all records will be submitted to the iRecord biological records database.
May 2023 - South Stoke May Fayre - Monday 1st May
Dr Melanie Gibbs, Insect Community Ecologist at the UK Centre for Ecology & Hydrology, Wallingford will be joining us again at our May Fayre stall - everyone is welcome to pop by and join in with our activities!
May 2023 - Dragonfly walk - Sunday 28th May
The popular dragonfly walks return in 2023.
June 2023 - SSWCG Quiz Night - Thursday 15th June
Surveys
April 2023 - Bat walk - Friday 14th April.
Meet at the Perch & Pike at 19:30.
Our wildflower walks will continue in 2023 and we'll be adding some new locations to our schedule. Once we have dates we'll add them here and to our Facebook group.
July 2023 - Glow worm walk - Saturday 22nd July
We walk around the village and look for glow worms - will we see more than last year?
Past events
March 2023 - Hedge planting session, Sunday 5th March.
February 2023 - Fruit tree maintenance event on the recreation ground, Sunday 5th February.
January 2023 - Hedge planting sessions, Saturday 7th and Sunday 8th January.
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October 2022 - Chilli & quiz night at the Perch & Pike
May - September 2022 - Sunflower growing competition
August 2022 - Bat walk and nature trail at open gardens event
July 2022 - Glow worm survey
June 2022 - Dragonfly walk
Spring & summer 2022 - Wildflower surveys
May 2022 - May Fayre stall, visit to Brightwell cum Sotwell Community Orchard, and curry & quiz night at the Perch & Pike
April 2022 - No Mow May sign design competition & Simon Booker's talk on 'Giving a Voice to the Animals of Oxfordshire' talk.
March 2022 - Jubilee Tree - South Stoke recreation ground
Throughout 2022 - Hedgerow survey
January 2022 - Hedge planting