NORTH DOWNS & BEYOND

A post-midnight Tawny Owl, heard calling from the gardens in front of the house, kicked off this latest lockdown sideshow. Two brief birding forays were made - this morning to Priest Hill (very quiet, scratching around for the odd Redwing or Meadow Pipit) - and this afternoon to Canons Farm, where a Barn Owl put on a hunting performance between 14.30 - 45hrs, before being seen to re-enter its roosting site having caught nothing. A very modest video can be endured, above. A flock of 50+ Skylarks and a group of 8 Meadow Pipit helped rescue a rather quiet time. And so the first day (of who knows how many) is underway - bringing with it the chance to discover all sorts of wonderful natural history on my doorstep, or, if not, a step closer to madness.

The 3km circle based on the shape of a square. All is explained... They're all at it, all of my blogging chums - Seth, Jono, Stewart, Gavin, Dylan - you can see their blogs over on the right hand side of the screen under the 'Worthy Blogs' tab. And what have they all been up to? Adopting lockdown recording areas, close to home and in the spirit of community welfare, that's what. And all credit to them for doing so. Some of them have decided to record in an area within a five kilometre circumference from home - others have plumped to go imperial and swap kilometres for miles. As for me, I’ve dithered about somewhat. At the end of last year I’d decided to keep within my Uber patch, but that is an area where the extremities need a car journey. After the early-January lockdown I switched to my mini-Uber patch, the furthest point being maybe two-hours on foot from home. But, in light of the way that this pandemic is evolving, there was no way that I now feel comfortable in e...

The latest Government suggestion is that we behave as if we ‘have the virus’, which would mean that none of us leave home for any reason at all - no shopping, no going to work, no exercise. The GOV.UK website is, however, suggesting that we can still exercise, once a day and locally. There is no definition of ‘local’ nor of any time constraint. And does exercise mean that we can birdwatch during said exercise? From a personal point of view, seeing that the government have announced that fishing and rough shooting can be considered as exercise, I’m taking that as a green light to carry my binoculars without guilt. As for the vague definition of what is local, I’ve decided to only birdwatch from home, on foot. In effect this has confined my birding radius to Canons Farm, Epsom and Walton Downs, Epsom Common and the watery Ewell sites (plus the dry Priest Hill). Of course we may get further directives which are more detailed, and these may alter my take on it, but for the time being this ...