Brookmill
Nature Reserve
Site Features
Trees:
The steep
sides of the old viaduct are wooded, before management began the
dominant tree was sycamore. Much of these have been replaced with native
species such as hazel, hornbeam and field maple. |
Plants:
Natural
ground plants include bramble, ivy and cow parsley, and have been
supplemented by planting such species as wood anenome and yellow
archangel. Many of the other ground plants here, such as greater
stitchwort and gorse were rescued from the old William Curtis Ecological
Park when it was developed in 1985.
On the top of the slope is a small
wildflower meadow, seeded and planted @ 1986, including salad burnet,
bird’s-foot-trefoil, oxeye daisy, hedge bedstraw and wild marjoram.
The three created ponds contain amongst
other plants, reed sweet grass and greater spearwort, with duckweed and
common oxygenators. |
Birds:
Unusual for
an urban site, long-tailed tit, lesser whitethroat and blackcap thrive
here.
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Other Animals:
Foxes, and, in the
ponds, sticklebacks, frogs, and smooth newts, common darter dragonflies
(breeding?).
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Other Features:
The
site is a demolished viaduct that spanned over Brookmill Road, the line
it carried went from Nunhead to Greenwich Park.Closed in 1916 as a
wartime economy. Lewisham purchased the land in 1979, and with the help
of local people, staff from Ashmead Primary School, and the Lewisham
Wildlife Trust, site was developed as an educational resource
representing as many habitats as possible on its small area.
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