A duck walks into a car park – no this isn’t the start of a gag routine, a baby duck did walk into the Watford Observer car park and was scooped into a plastic crate because it was in danger of being squashed by traffic. After all the staff crowded in to take a look, someone took a picture and then my colleague and I decided to try and reunite Quark (as we had named the little mite) back with his mother as quickly as possible. We managed to get him into a smaller box with a lid without touching him, as this can lead to a mother rejecting her young. Luckily, it wasn’t long before we heard her calls from a grassy spot behind the fence, and Quark started leaping about like a mad thing. We gently placed the box beside the fence – saw mum with three ducklings following her, and then Quark went out of sight. We waited anxiously, and were then delighted to see her soon after with four ducklings in tow.

I recount this incident because shortly after I was talking to urban birder David Lindo about his forthcoming talks for The Lee Valley Regional Park’s Spring Wildlife Weekend, on Sunday, May 17. I asked him what he’d do in a such a situation.

“This time of year there are a lot of young birds around. If they’ve fallen and are injured the best thing to do is leave it alone. The mother or father may be nearby, and in nature it is best to leave it to itself as you’re not guaranteed to save it, and if you take it on board you’ll have to feed it day and night for days and days as bodies like the RSPB won’t take them. Sometimes people see a bird in danger, like a blackbird, being attacked by a sparrowhawk and they want to intervene but predators prey on the weak and if it’s injured you’d just be prolonging its suffering.”

David’s response may seem a little harsh, but his knowledge of birdlife in the urban environment is second to none. David has written and appeared on the BBC’s The One Show and recently appeared on Springwatch looking for wildlife on the wing in Wormwood Scrubs, home to the prison but also a rich urban space for birding, which David has been exploring for the past 17 years.

He tells me his interest in birds began at an early age.

”When I was only five years old living in Willesden, I was finding mummy birds and daddy birds, which weren’t from the same species. They were starlings and blackbirds respectively, and then I began to notice baby birds and uncle birds. By the age of eight, I was taking my schoolmates on tours of our local woods. One day, I found a kestrel and told the headmaster and he said ‘David, you don’t get kestrels in cities’. From that point on, I started to look for urban wildlife.”

Previously head of membership at the British Trust for Ornithology, David is the author of many articles on urban birdlife. His motto is anything, anywhere, anytime.

He says: “A lot of people don’t see birds because they don’t know where to look. Just look up, even on Oxford Street you’ll see things, you don’t have to go to a specific place. In concreted areas around The Tate Modern you can see sparrowhawks looking for finches. London is rich in parks and has a network of reserves. In winter, you see gulls from Russia, robins in spring from the Continent, and swifts from Africa in the summer. I think about the journeys they’ve had and the things they’ve seen. They’ve spent three or four years on the wing after leaving the nest.”

So how can we encourage birds to settle in urban areas?

“Leave an area of garden unkempt to attract insects as young birds need them for protein. Hedges and bushes are important. There’s a national shortage of holes, so rather than chopping old trees down, leave them for wildlife.”

As well as talks and workshops on the birds and the bees there are plenty of other free activities.

Spring Wildlife Weekend takes place on Saturday, May 16 and Sunday, May 17 from 10am to 4.30pm daily at the WaterWorks Nature Reserve, Lammas Road, off Lea Bridge Road, Leyton. Details: www.leevalleypark.org.uk