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If the tantalising arrival of spring has you itching to get out and explore London wildlife, here’s some exciting news. The capital just got another designated nature reserve.
This month Ealing Council named Warren Farm in Southall a Local Nature Reserve. The meadow, which was once a sports ground, has been mostly empty for 15 years. Gradually, the park has been rewilded into a grassland habitat for wildflowers, birds, butterflies and bees.
Warren Farm is most notable for its skylarks – in fact, almost a quarter of London’s entire skylark breeding population calls the space home. Other local critters include hairstreak butterflies, barn owls, little owls, and kestrels.
London’s newest nature reserve is part of a wider project called Brent River Park: a 50-year-old string of green-spaces connected by the River Brent, which runs from Barnet into the Thames via Southall. Warren Farm will also form part of West London Regional Park, a series of connected leafy spots between Ealing and Hounslow.
At 24.8 hectares, Warren Farm Nature Reserve is only slightly bigger than St James Park (about the size of three football fields). Alongside the Local Nature Reserve declaration, the council is building a cricket and football field on Imperial College London land to replace the sports grounds.
Leader of Ealing Council Cllr Peter Mason said that nature reserve designation will provide ‘a much-needed green lung for this part of the borough.’
Locals have been campaigning for the Warren Farm Nature Reserve since 2021, with more than 26,000 signatories supporting the project. Katie Boyles, the chair of Brent River Park charity and organiser of the campaign, said: ‘We are pleased that the centrepiece of our vision of connected meadow habitats is now officially recognised as a Local Nature Reserve.
‘Our rewilded urban meadow has become a place of solace for our community.’
Warren Farm was officially named a nature reserve on March 9. Nearby nature reserves include Camley Street Natural Park and Gunnersbury Triangle in Chiswick.
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