We gathered for a special early morning start for today's Community Mission helping the Bristol Butterfly Conservation group. We met Matt from BBC who firstly showed us his very own nature area including his celeb duck, Quackers, who thinks it's a chicken). Due to our pun background, we preferred the not chosen name of Duck Norris. Either way, he is one cool duck.

After this, we were given tools and Dave and Clo headed to a green space to rake all of the mown grass and move it. This allows the grass to stay nutrient-free which encourages wildflowers to grow. Between the two of them they covered a quarter of this massive area in just 45 minutes. Meanwhile, the rest of us headed to a mini-roundabout which had been sprayed by weed killer at the start of the year and all of the flowers in it had been killed. A few hardy wildflowers had now made a comeback and we wanted to help more of them to create a butterfly haven. We got to work digging up all of the poisoned soil, bagging it up and refreshing the area with compost. We then planted some new wild flowers which will seed and spread to make the area thrive once again. Although it was a small area, it was hard work and we just managed to lay the compost when our time was up. Job well done!

You might think I'm writing this report due to my exquisite knowledge of plants and my recent dissertation on the benefits of kidney vetch in urban eras but alas, I took an enthusiastic photo of a leopard slug and here we are..

8 Goodgymers met this evening (some via foot and others via the com-mish-mobile) to help out Matt and the small blue butterflies of Bristol who are a priority species that are under threat from a housing development. The Bristol Munching Caterpillars project is working hard to create a new suitable habitat nearby, by planting a variety of bulbs to attract small blue caterpillars.

After a briefing from Matt, we set to work using trowels and dibbers to create space to plant kidney vetch and birds foot trefoil. As we were busy planting, Claire and Danica joined us and were tasked with de-heading some buddleias before becoming fully fledged members of the kidney vetch-erans. Despite forgetting her running shoes and having to wear her loafers, Alex kicked off a plant and trowel photoshoot and put us to shame looking more glamorous than the cover of Vogue.

We quickly moved to 3 different areas planting as we went and before we knew it we'd successfully planted 180 bulbs! Just as it began to drizzle, we set off home, with the runners stopping to say hello to some grazing ponies before attempting to keep up with Richard speedy gonzales Breakspear. A job well done!

.. Did you know common Birds foot trefoil (or as it's known to fellow experts, lotus corniculatus) is a member of the pea family. Its flowers look like little slippers and appear in small clusters. They are followed by seed pods and look distinctly like bird's feet and claws. Some parts of the plant are thought to be medicinal and edible for humans however others are poisonous so probably not worth the risk.

Big thank you to Alex for her impressive pun-skills!