NORTH DOWNS & BEYOND

Venue: Gander Green Lane, Sutton Event: FA Cup second round, Sutton United v Cheltenham Town I was standing with fellow birder Frankie Prater and his son James. As normal, if the three of us are watching Sutton play, our conversation is a mixture of football (when James gets involved), or birding (when James glazes over). This afternoon was no different. Yesterday's Cattle Egret was a conversation piece, as was my observation of a Lapwing flying over last Saturday's Sutton v Aldershot match. We joked that if the football was boring we could always revert to sky watching for birds. "Maybe even a Cattle Egret" quipped Frankie. Twenty minutes later we were watching a Little Egret sail over, low and to the west... Frankie wasn't far wrong with his prediction! The score? 2-1 to Sutton, the winner scored deep into injury time. Not a bad afternoon all round.

Fate plays such a role in our birding endeavours - and today was such an example. I wasn't actually going anywhere with my bins this morning, as domestic chores beckoned. However, a last minute reprieve saw me with a couple of hours to spare, so I ran out the door and decided to just walk the ten minutes or so to Priest Hill SWT reserve on the Ewell/Banstead border. That was lucky break number one... Last Friday when visiting the site I had come across a small flock of Reed Buntings, and was keen to relocate them. My plan was to make one slow circuit of the largest meadow before heading back home. When half-way round I bumped into an old work-colleague who was walking her dog, so then found myself continuing on the loop, deep in conversation and not really birding at all. When I reached the end of the circuit (and my work-colleague had left for home) I decided to retrace my steps as I hadn't really given the area a good grilling. That was lucky break number two... On my sec...

A ringing alarm clock pierced the dark and woke me into a cold, still world. A glance out of the bedroom window confirmed that there was a heavy frost. The world looked pretty - from the twinkling stars down to the twinkling pavements - a winter wonderland that was soon to see me off to Beddington Sewage Farm. With a packed rucksack I ventured out of the back door to retrieve my bike from the garage, freezing to touch, not really all that inviting a prospect. The cold was chilling, but a four mile ride would soon warm me up. There was little traffic to detract me from watching my breath form into a grey vapour before my eyes. Apart from a fox dashing across the road in front of me my journey was uneventful, my eastward procession lit by the barely emerging sun. It all seemed portentous this dawning of the new day, full of hope and pregnant with possibility. Cycling over Hackbridge bridge and onto Mile Road opened up the farm on either side of me, the fields shockingly white with a se...

A morning spent at Canons Farm in the company of Geoff Barter - plus the confiding Common Buzzard (above), that has taken to hanging around Reeds Rest Cottages. The buzzard appears to be well and can fly without difficulty, so why it is being so unadventurous and 'tame' I do not know. Whatever its reasons, it sits on top of roofs, chimneys, barns and posts with little care for the passing birder. The image above has not been cropped and was taken with a bridge camera. A calmer, more sunnier day would be hard to find in the early winter, and although I couldn't claim that it was warm, the need for hat, gloves and scarf was redundant. There weren't many birds on show, so Geoff and I had to make do with a slow wander and plenty of waffle between the two of us. A flock of 60+ Skylark and a low count of four Yellowhammer (below) was made. Although I don't particularly want any, a dose of hard weather is needed to stir the ornithological pot up.

Redpolls can be troublesome - troublesome, that is, if you start trying to identify every single individual that you come across. The problem is that they vary so much. At its simplest, we have three species: Lesser (Carduelis cabaret), Mealy or Common (Carduelis flammea) and Arctic (Carduelis hornemanni), although different authorities split these still further, while others lump them. It's confusing to say the least. Even when you have them in the hand it is not always a straightforward matter of clinching the identification, but sometimes it is. Take these two Mealies (Commons) that were trapped at Dungeness in early November, along with several accompanying Lessers. They were clearly larger, were heavier and the colouration was at once different. The top two images are of the same bird, whereas the bottom picture is of the second individual. I came across these images whilst having a look through the several hundred pictures that I took during my recent stay at Dunge...

Is the field notebook becoming a threatened species? I ask, because I rarely see anybody using one nowadays. It was a staple of the birder's weaponery 'back in the day', as much a part of the ornithological arsenal as your bins, scope and ex-army jacket. Don't get this confused with the posh log book back at home, where the field notes were written up all neat of hand and full of additional flourish - I'm referring to the small, pocket-sized notebook where the day's counts and descriptions would be jotted down whilst in the field. These could get dirty, spattered in mud, wet with rain, crinkled at the edge and have pages torn from its innards - it was a tool of the field and if I ever left home without one I felt bereft. And if I did forget it then I have been known to then use any scrap of paper, inside of a field guide or back of a hand to scribble down all of that important info. Well, I say important meaning that it was to me. I did take it all a little to s...

A brisk 15 minute walk from the front door sees me stepping onto Surrey Wildlife Trust's Priest Hill Reserve - all ex-farmland, then municipal playing fields, now reverting to scrubby grassland. It is quite high (for Surrey) and although not an obvious ornithological hot-spot, it does turn up a fair selection of passerine passage migrants. Today's surprise was a flock of four Reed Buntings (all females, one above). Locally, this is pretty amazing stuff. Nearby were a male and two female Stonechats, a species which is a regular passage migrant and winter visitor to this reserve. I always check them for an accompanying Dartford Warbler, but no luck again today. A further twenty minutes on finds me at the River Hogsmill in Ewell Village, a small watercourse that I could just about jump over (given a long run-up and my legs and lungs of 40 years ago). The three species that are almost a given at this time of year were present and correct - Little Egret, Kingfisher and Grey Wag...