Reedswood Park Pond Restoration
Reedswood Park is a wonderful greenspace in the centre of Walsall, with walking routes, ponds, and children play areas. It’s a great place for the local community to get outdoors, but unfortunately its ponds were not in their best state. Some of the ponds were overgrown with plants, or shallow due to a build-up of silt. This prevented them from being amazing habitat for our amphibians, such as our great crested newts, who like to do their courtship displays in open patches of water.
Thankfully, the West Midlands Combined Authority provided us with a grant to restore and create new ponds at the park, transforming it into an amazing wetland mosaic.
With the help of Froglife Ecological Services we restored one large pond and 2 small ponds in the park, whilst creating 3 new ponds for wildlife. These ponds will now provide even better habitat for freshwater wildlife, including amphibians, and enhance the park for the whole community.
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Reedswood Park Celebration Sculpture
Thanks to funding and support from the Ironmongers Company we recently worked with the amazing sculptural artist Luke Perry to craft and install a steelwork sculpture in Reedswood Park. The design of the spectacular artwork celebrates the new ponds and was directed through consultation with community members and school children local to the park. We received wonderful feedback during these sessions and found that our Common Frog was the winning animal they wanted to be represented within the sculpture!
The sculpture was unveiled on the 25th of October 2024, by Louise Harrison the Deputy Mayor of Walsall, Richard McVittie from Walsall Healthy Spaces, Shokt Fazal from Birchills Agenda 21 and Luke Perry. We hope that everyone who sees this wonderful leaping frog will be inspired to join us as “we protect nature” and to be proud of Walsall’s wonderful wildlife.
“The frog is beautiful. He’s well-made and people are going to love him. People driving or walking past will definitely see and enjoy this”. – Louise Harrison, deputy mayor.
“The sculpture caps off a successful project that changes the way that people see Reedswood park. The sculpture celebrates nature, something the council are keen to continue working on going forward” – Richard McVittie, Walsall Council.
“Working on the We Protect Nature piece was a wonderful experience as it’s very much in line with my own ethics. It’s so important to allow the small amount of wildlife that we have left in this country to thrive. Hopefully artwork like this draws attention to the importance of these small areas in our urban spaces that ecosystems can develop and invests people in their success.” – Luke Perry, sculpture artist.
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Visit the sculpture
Why not go and see the sculpture for yourself?