SATRO Research Placement Blog - Thomas Banks

For the last 6 days, I have been to 3 different schools. Firstly, the very big St. George's. Here I did birds surveys, sweep netting and pollinator surveys. I was surprised by how many different plants there were, but they were just for show and lacked little insect life. Though the amount of woodland bird species and the herd of deer there was impressive, it is due to the surroundings and not the careful management of the school grounds. Secondly, we went to the very small Godolphin school in Slough. Here the number of species was less due to the size of the place, but also because it was surrounded. However, they have attempted to promote biodiversity by creating a wildlife area, where I did some pond dipping and caught many freshwater hog-lice and shrimps. I was also surprised to see more than one goldcrest there. The final 2 days wrere spent at the Bishopsgate school, which was just an average sized school. As always, I did the bird surveys, but I also set up some longworth traps, trail cameras and pitfall traps. We caught a field mouse, foxes, rabbits and more. This was my last day doing the project, and I found out the following day the rest of the team had caught our first field vole. Now I need to analyse the data and write a report!

Hoglouse - Godolphin

Fungi - Bishopsgate