This Sunday's late afternoon session at Southall's Tiny Forest was a part of the Wildlife Survey that takes place each year in May. After Saturday's surveys in Acton and Hanger Hill, we noticed that each new session brought more GoodGymers involved. Today we even had a guest from GoodGym Hounslow, Pezh!

Pezh joined Sevan and Kash and Steph, a trio who stuck with each other for four GoodGym tasks that day: running, walking, bramble & balsam bashing, woodchipping, and, of course, drinking coffee - what else would keep them going today!

💔 Sevan, who hadn't stopped believing in butterflies, conducted a third butterfly count this weekend - again, with zero butterflies recorded. Those butterflies are surely breaking records (in a no-show category) - and Sevan's heart!
🪰 Kash tried her luck with the pollinator survey - spotting a few flies, a bumblebee and a honeybee
🐜 Pezh and Steph had probably the most luck, uncovering a lot of wildlife in their ground dweller survey, particularly ants and larvae! Steph said the survey did not even allow him to enter as many ants as he and Pezh estimated under one of the tiles - over 50!
🚮 A true GoodGymer never says no to doing an extra good deed! Sevan made a makeshift rubbish bag out of a bakery packaging he had found in the Tiny Forest and conducted a Tiny Litter Pick. He was more successful in that than his earlier survey and uncovered the uncomfortable truth - Southall Tiny Forest was attracting more litter than butterflies!

We are not done with the wildlife surveys in Ealing, oh no! One more is coming in a week's time at Cuckoo Park and we hope to see you there!

Horsenden Farm is like a neutron star of West London - its gravity pulls in the GoodGymers from areas near Ealing and they just cannot escape its allure. This Saturday the farm stole three people from GoodGym Hounslow: Gus, already a Horsenden regular, and two quite new adventurers: Pezhman and Maxime.

Maria from GoodGym Ealing was another novice to the most popular Saturday session in the area. Gaby and Simon were well acquainted with the farm, meadows and woodlands of Horsenden Hill, but new to the volunteering days. Steph Ducat, Sevan and Kash on the other hand, have seen all the animals, tried all the pizza flavours and kept the farm in motion almost every month, moving all sorts of things that needed moving: from unglamorous soil and manure to heavy objects like safes and logs.

Today's task was on the heavy-duty side. Nick, being in charge of volunteers while Elsa was away, thought GoodGymers might be perfectly suited to remove wood and fence panels from the area that was going to become an enclosure for fell ponies - the newest addition to the farm!

"When the ponies arrive, they will be helping us move the logs from the woods." - Nick
"What the GoodGymers will be doing then?" - Kash
"You will ride the ponies!"

The fence parts were to be stacked against one of the sheds (the one that still had some space behind it). There was one problem: the panels were very big and very heavy, also awkward to carry with hardly any grip. Pezhman came up with an idea to use ropes, which was trialled. Eventually, the most utilised tools were muscles and brains. Once all the panels were miraculously fitted around the shed, leaned against three walls, the heaviest log made its way out of the future pony enclosure on a wheelbarrow.

The GoodGymers completed the challenging task with 30 minutes spare (before the pizza oven started!). No one felt like sitting down and relaxing - that part happens at noon! Nick offered our team a bonus task: wheelbarrowing woodchip from the car park and dropping it alongside the greenhouse. That kept us busy until the pizza gods summoned their priest to fire up the oven and feed the hardworking folk.

That is the way of Horsenden, the ritual that happened regularly in the past and will happen again in the future. Make sure you are a part of this tasty and rewarding future and sign up for the April session now!