NORTH DOWNS & BEYOND

Regular readers of this blog may have noticed that, with increasing regularity, I cannot but take this hobby of ours a little bit too seriously - or rather, I read too much into it. To me, it is a minefield of angst, disappointments, social failures and self-denial. I recognised that I needed help... Two days ago I checked into a newly opened wing of The Priory, called the 'Svensson Rooms'. This establishment started to take in the 'natural history needy' only last November. Each guest had a small bedroom, with an Observer's Book of Birds placed on the bedside table, which we were encouraged to read each night as a reminder of how we all began our enjoyment of 'birdwatching'. This word, 'birdwatching', was exclusively used throughout my stay, with any other term used by the guests (such as 'birder', 'birding' or 'ornithologist') being drowned out by Ring-necked Parakeet calls played over the tannoy system. Each subsequent us

Each year, as winter marches on into February, and the first stirrings of spring start to show, I become readied. Ready to welcome the growing number of moths to the MV. Ready to start taking in the first flowering violets. Ready to be made happy by the first flash of Wheatear white or the flick of a hirundine's wing. Time slows down, with each day of late February and early March revealing just a little bit of what's to come. Slowly, ever so slowly, it is adding to the building anticipation. And then - WHOOSH! It happens all at once. From bare trees to riots of blossom - from winter thrushes to summer swallows - from a lone Brimstone to a veritable selection box of butterflies in the garden. It happens too quickly, as if winter suddenly gives up the ghost with a violent shudder and instantaneously sheds its skin to reveal spring finery underneath. Every year I feel as if I've somehow missed the moment when this metamorphosis takes place. I want to rewind and take it al

Apologies to Bob Dylan for nicking one of his song titles for the title of this post. Today, faced with the prospect of going anywhere in the UK to further my knowledge and appreciation of the natural world, I chose to visit Walton and Banstead Heath. Even on a local scale, these places are as inspirational as a car tyre puncture at midnight in a ghetto full of crack whores and smackheads. However... ...I had a bloody great time. Birding was helped along by a couple of cracking Mealy Redpolls. I took loads of pictures of, as of yet, unidentified fungi and lichen. The sun shone. I walked along with a beatific smile on my face that couldn't have been bettered by a troupe of Hari-Krishna's on a recruitment drive. Part of Walton Heath is a golf course. One of the golfers, spying my binoculars, asked me if I had to come and look at the new pond that they had created. Not knowing that it existed I went along to take a look.It looked interesting (see above). Thoughts of summer

Another night, another back garden MV haul. When I say haul, I really mean a modest catch. Amongst the sobre colours of various Quakers, Characters and Drabs was this Red-green Carpet, my first this year. Twenty years ago this was a very rare moth in Surrey and London, but now it is to be expected, but such smart moths are never a chore to look at.

Last night's garden MV haul was better than expected given the large moon and clear spells. New for the year were Double-striped Pug, Early Grey and this plume moth, Emmelina monodactyla . Very common, but I cannot help but like them.

My name is Steve and I'm socially inept because of birding. "Thank you for coming this evening Steve and sharing that with us. Would you like to tell us when you first realised this?" It really began when I was at art college. My fellow students would meet up at weekends, go to concerts, have all-day benders in back-street pubs. They might even try some, well, illicit substances. Oh, and there was that other pleasure that I hadn't tried yet - something that involved women... "Do you mean sex Steve?" Er- yes. Well, I didn't have time for any of that really, because if I'd gone out and done all of those things during a weekend, I would have missed out at what was happening at Beddington Sewage Farm! "Please, will some of you at the back stop sniggering. Steve is being very honest here. Please carry on..." I couldn't miss a weekend birding. Especially if we went to Dungeness or Pagham Harbour. Or on a twitch... "You said

Beddington beckoned, and I was not the only one that it beckoned for, as a fine gathering of group members plus those attending two organised walks took place at the hallowed sewage farm. Bird-wise it is still quiet, save for four Common Buzzards (heading NW) and a lone Dunlin. I took the opportunity to cover the southern portion of the area to collect further botanical records for my survey of the site's plant life. This, too, was fairly uninspiring, with great swathes of Hemlock and Cow Parsley starting to flourish and monopolise, but not yet flower. Most of the interest will come from the alien species that will briefly flourish in the areas of landfill and soil dumping before they are bulldozed out of sight.

A mild night with drizzle prompted me putting out the MV in the garden. A modest catch included Oak Beauty (top) and Twin-spotted Quaker (bottom).

This morning there was a swathe of yellow across the disturbed ground at Beddington Sewage Farm and most of it belonged to the flowers of Colt's-foot. There is something slightly disturbing about this plant, as it punches its way through the earth with reptilian-scaled stems to unfurl the buttery-yellow flowers. Not much on the move, not even a sniff of hirundine despite a steady southerly wind. A Dunlin and two Water Pipts were highlights, although as usual much enjoyment was had with the lads, standing by the northern lake, bantering away.

No, I haven't posted for several days, not out of anything other than a lack of a reason to do so. However, I have been royally rewarded by: Tottenham Hotspur reaching the last eight of the Champion's league; watching Professer Brian Cox explain how time will ultimately cease to exist and making me understand how this will happen; viewing two excellent BBC4 documentarries on guitar-genius Peter Green and also the incestuous History of Fleetwood Mac; realising that I had left Glow-worm off of my pan-species list; drinking Jacques cider (which is expensive and poncey); listening to Scott Matthews (check his albums out); reading grip-off text messages from the birding-boy-wonder David Campbell; re-reading Ian Marchant's excellent book about the greatest pub-crawl ever. I might get out at the weekend...

An early start at Canons Farm on Saturday was rewarded with two flyover Waxwings but little else. I resorted to poking around the rotten wood in the nearby woodland where I discovered some Yellow Cobweb (a fungi), an addition to the all-powerful pan-species list. This unassuming fungus is pictured above.

Click here to read about the demise of the owl, kicked off the pitch by a thoughtless south American footballer. What a tosser....

I was nosing around the Field Studies Council website, eyeing up identification guides for obscure insect orders, when I came across a guide to flat-flies. That set alarm bells ringing! I used to hold a ringing permit (I gave up my A-permit in 1983) and back in the mid to late 1970s helped ring at Beddington Sewage Farm. We used to regularly mist net Swifts, and these birds were commonly infested with flat flies, something I had totally forgotten about until this evening. A bit of research revealed that these flat-flies are of the species  Crataerina pallida . So, 33 years after I last handled a Swift and saw one of the birds 'tenants', I can add it to my pan-species list. The ultimate armchair tick...

Click here to see and read about a south American footballer indulging in a spot of owl abuse. It's actually quite shocking.