Wild Eton Wick asked for our help help, so Garry, Sheila, first-timer Maggie, and Shelley visiting from GoodGym Slough, met with taskowners Claire and Andrew at Cooleys Meadow. We trundled the equipment across the meadow, and Claire gave us an introduction to the area. A small copse of trees has been planted up, and a bank is being created which will be a haven for butterflies. It is hoped to especially encourage the marbled white butterfly. While we left Andrew to strim around the young saplings, the rest of us set off to dig up some buddleia plants from a nearby field. These are unwanted by the farmer, so they are to be relocated to the butterfly bank. Although the plants didn't look that large, they had an extensive root system, established over many years. We employed spades, forks, saws and pure brute force and determination to dig and hack our way through to free the bushes. We ended up with 4 good-sized plants which we took back to the butterfly bank, and were joined by Amy on the way. There, we planted the bushes on the top of the bank, luckily a much easier task than digging them up had been. Hopefully they will now live up to their common name of the Butterfly bush, attracting butterflies and other insects to feed on it's nectar. While Shelley dispersed some seed bombs containing butterfly-friendly plants on the bank, the others planted some fresh tree whips to replace those which had succumbed to last year's drought. A very satisfying morning's work, and Claire was grateful for our help, as ever As Shelley succinctly put it: 'digging, relocating buddleia, planting baby trees & sowing wildlife seeds. Fun!'

1 hour bird count in my back garden. Did not see as many birds land as usual...but maybe they knew I was watching 😂

Goodgymmers from across the country joined forces to contribute to the RSPB Big Garden Birdwatch 2023.

The idea is that you sit and watch your garden or local green space for 1 hour and tally up how many birds you see. They only count if they land, not fly overhead and you only count the largest group you see at one time (to make sure you aren't counting the same individuals several times!)

This information will give the RSPB an idea of bird populations and which ones may be struggling and need support. So far, over 5 MILLION results have been logged, but watchers have until Feb 19th to submit results.

4 members of GG Sheffield were hosted by Celine and we took turns surveying her garden for the hour whilst the others crafted. Highlight was a teeny wren, which she'd never seen before in her garden.

Jenni from Ealing was pleased to see a flock of starlings.

Gwyn and Tracey from GG Derby joined forces to do 2 watches in each other's gardens. Gwyn managed to get some excellent shots of the birds on his feeders, although their usual goldfinch customers eluded them this time.

Georgeta had a visit from what she calls "our" woodpecker... "Well we believe there are most likely 3 of them , in summer we saw the mother with 2 chicks together, but they only come one at the time now. 😃"

Amy from Maidenhead reported "Just three fat pigeons for me! I could hear lots of other birds and see some nests but couldn’t see the birds. I don’t think it helped that my children were out too and making lots of noise. I will appreciate it much more now when I see birds whilst out and about"

Sheila said "my highlight was a male blackcap and 10 goldfinches - I knew we had a few visiting every morning, but had never actually counted them before! Thanks for encouraging everyone to join in"

As we hit the last of our group sessions of the year we should take great pride in knowing that we've collectively achieved 588 good deeds. Our biggest achievers being Jen and Pam.

Well done to you all! and thank you for putting in the effort to keep GG Slough going.

With 90 group sessions between group runs and community missions completed here are our top 5 task owners for 2022.

5th Place

Knock on the door for 4 sessions each with Everyone Active; Parvaaz, BBOWT and Salthill junior parkrun!

4th Place

Tom mix with 6 sessions at Wexham Park Hospital

3rd Place

Lucky 7 sessions for Home-Start, Slough Refugees and Thames Hospice

2nd Place

Shut the garden gate for 8 sessions with Artful Hub

1st Place

One score for Slough Borough Council and all the litter picks, vaccine shifts and playground tidy ups we've done this year. A whopping 20 sessions!

So lets summarise 2022 in the only way that GoodGym can...in a punny way.

January started all fresh and new with a challenge or two, or legs got tired walking all those miles yet we made it through. We wanted to make a difference in this month as we CAN and boy we did, with our huge food donation to Slough Outreach.

February was a blast with a cold spell and no punning in the hallway as we started to help out local schools. We also got a bit trashy...but that theme continued all year!

March was not for the paint hearted as we continued to help Artful hub with their newly acquired unit and plenty of painting.

April was spent in gardens...we chairished the outdoor furniture tasks at Slough Refugees.

May found us sowing the seeds of love with the allotment project.

June was about walking on sunshine and getting as much vitamin D as possible as we enjoyed the warm nights.

July was about making sure we tree-ted our saplings trees as the warm weather continued to shine down on us. Plus it was our 4th birthday month!

August - Oops weed did it again, with our plentiful tasks of weeding, digging and plotting.

September saw the first sightings of the darker nights as we tried our best to finish off those outdoor daylight requiring tasks

October was all about not leafing anyone out with our leaf clearance tasks

November saw the first release from the Golden Girls! more to come from them next year!

And now as we head towards the end of the year we have the festive month of December which has brought us Sleighing with Santa, Happy Holly-days and today, it gave us the gift that keeps giving with our hamper making task with Slough Outreach.

Just on that...a huge thank you to Shelley, Jean, Nisha, Harsha, Pam and Agnia for all their help today making a grand total of 51 hampers for Slough Outreach. They gave it 100 present today with an extra-long session. And another special thank you to Jen and Sut for donating the wrapping paper.

As always a massive thank you to everyone who has attended a group run, a community mission or a mission this year.

We really wouldn't be a Community Group without YOU!

Wishing you all a lovely restful festive break and I look forward to seeing you in 2023!

Manjit