NORTH DOWNS & BEYOND

As I needed to be close to home today I embarked on a day-long 'on-off' sky watch. On the whole it was disappointing, with very few birds passing overhead, hirundines at barely a trickle, with the odd Chaffinch and Meadow Pipit thrown in to punctuate the quiet. However, the coming of winter was encapsulated by two Redwing (the autumn's first) that flew west early on and a further four landed in a neighbouring garden early in the evening. These are quite early, my 'firsts' are normally not until early October. It was interesting to see that there was a sprinkle of sightings of this fine thrush across the county today. Another intriguing aspect of today was a steady passage of Stock Doves, with at least 100 heading south. These are likely to be local birds moving between feeding sites rather than migrants, although the odd flock was quite high and purposeful. Over the past five years this species has become much commoner in 'my' part of Surrey, with Canons Far...

It started when I reached the most western (and highest) part of Walton Downs. I was on the edge of one of the Langley Vale Farm copses when I heard a number of Greylag Geese calling - (not to be sniffed at locally) - estimating that maybe half a dozen might be involved. I scanned the sky, picked up two geese coming towards me and was puzzled by the fact that there were only the two of them and that they were both Canada. Nothing else came along, and it all went quiet. Only a minute later I came in view of a small part of a large stubble field. And not 100m away were 13 of these: Now, 13 Greylag Geese may not mean much to you, but away from Holmethorpe and Beddington, this is a ND&B moment of joy! The geese were restless and started to walk away, down the hill and out of view. I followed them, creeping along the edge of a copse until it stopped, revealing to me a panoramic view of the whole field - which looked like this!! Bloody hell, had I been transported to Slimbrid...