It was an early start, 00:01 to be precise, but it was worth it. London Wildlife Trust’s Bird Race team were up with the nightingales yesterday in an attempt to spot as many birds as possible before 18:00 and beat off other bird watching teams from the likes of RSPB and WWT.

It was a bird race with a difference, organised by Natural England and Transport for London. There wasn’t a car in sight, with the teams relying on public transport to get them across the capital. The challenge was to be back at the London Transport Museum in Covent Garden by 18:00, where the results would be collated and the winner announced.

Tony, Ian, Honia and Gerri braved some pretty miserable weather, travelling across London from north to east in a bid to clock up as many species as possible. Walking over 15 miles, they visited places like Epping Forest, Walthamstow Reservoir and Rainham Marshes. Many hours of dedicated bird watching later, the team headed off to the finish line with an impressive 89 species under their belts.

It was a close finish but we won. In second place was WWT with 87 birds and third was the RSPB with 78. An amazing array of species were spotted, including peregrine, nightingale, kingfisher, cuckoo and avocet. Proof, if it were needed, that our city is home to some fantastic wildlife and wild spaces.

BBC London covered the event live and our winning team made the 18:30 news bulletin. Well done London Wildlife Trust!

A birder’s tale

Team member Ian Woodward looks back on a day of serious birding:

“We started just after midnight from Chingford, and walked up to a site in Epping Forest where we heard tawny owl and nightingale. We then waited for around three hours without much happening until the birds started up at 04:00. We heard a grasshopper warbler which, along with nightingale, was our target bird for the site.

We then walked to Enfield Island, recording a kingfisher en route, and caught a bus to Trent CP to look for woodland and farmland birds. Here we spotted the likes of lesser spotted woodpecker, linnet and red-legged partridge.

Next we went by tube from Cockfosters to Tottenham Hale and looked at Walthamstow Reservoirs for wildfowl. The best bird here was lesser whitethroat, which is a warbler that we hadn't found at Trent CP. At this point we had a total of 70 bird species on our list.

We then went by train from Blackhorse Road to Rainham, via Barking, and then by bus to Wennington and did the long walk to Rainham marshes - seeing a hobby enroute. At Rainham marshes we were mainly looking for wading birds that are hard to find elsewhere in London, and the best birds sighted here included Temminck's stint, male garganey, avocet and summer-plumaged grey plover.

We finished at around 15:30 and began our long journey back to the central London finishing line by foot, bus, train and tube.”