NORTH DOWNS & BEYOND

They say a change is as good as a rest, so rather than visit one of my many local patches, yesterday afternoon I took myself off to the Greensand Ridge of southern Surrey. It is an area that I do know in parts but have not visited for several years. Armed with the trusty OS map, I parked at Friday Street and made my way to Leith Hill via a number of footpaths, some that I had walked before and others that were unfamiliar. Several loops were taken in the name of 'exploration', a good couple of hours were spent on the open heathland of Duke's Warren (above), with the whole expedition ending with a magical strike out northwards from Broadmoor along the achingly beautiful Tilling Bourne valley. I have a confession to make. I'm not a great fan of the Greensand nor heathland. As I walked across, up and down the said area in question, I quizzed myself as to why that was. My most obvious dislike is of conifer plantations, especially when they are planted on dry, sandy soil. The...

The picture above was taken yesterday morning by Mark Davis, looking northwards from the parapet of Leith Hill Tower. It is an arresting image. In the middle ground is Box Hill, and you can clearly make out the viewpoint where a combination of the feet of thousands of visitors, and the driest May on record, have worn down the grass to a pale creamy buff. The wooded ridge behind that, all smoky blue and mysterious, is where the bulk of the 2017-18 Hawfinch irruption took up temporary residence. And looming up in the distance is the London skyline, one that, even ten years ago, would have looked very different. The tallest, needle-like structure on the right-hand side is The Shard. It is 26.5 miles - as the Hawfinch flies - from Leith Hill Tower. And beyond the structures of London you can make out the Chilterns as they run through Hertfordshire. If you do not know the area you could be forgiven for thinking that those of us who live on the capital’s fringes are looked down upon by ...

The new blog header comes from my good friend Gordon Hay, who took this photograph during one of the few recent sunny evenings whilst on the top of Colley Hill. The view is looking SSW towards Mordor  Leith Hill. I really should get my act together and produce a few more headers, although I do like my usual one so much that it will appear again in the future.

There are birding places that are famed for the sheer spectacle of the avian migration that appears above them - The Bosphorus. Eilat. Falsterbo. The Straits of Gibraltar. Leith Hill. Hold on, what was that last place mentioned? Leith Hill? That pimple of a hill to be found in deepest, darkest, southern Surrey? National Trust ranger and Indiana Jones look-a-like Sam Bayley has set up a migration watchpoint from Leith Hill Tower (the top of which measures in at a dizzying 1026 feet above sea-level). Big for us southerners, laughably small to you northerners. This morning was the first organised watch and eight motley Surrey birders (including myself) gathered out of a mixture of enthusiasm, nosiness and a belief that our much-maligned county has a migration hot-spot waiting to be discovered. We gathered at 05.45hrs in the dark. And in the fog. The picture above was taken at 07.00hrs, in the fog. You can just see the sun fighting a losing battle with the stuff. We were still fog-b...

18-spot Ladybird - you can see how small it compared with a finger tip Leith Hill was the venue for an afternoon of wandering the greensand slopes in the company of my family, plus an obligatory stop at the tea room in the tower for some excellent National Trust cake - oh, so Surrey - I could almost be an extra in Downton Abbey don't you know (albeit sent downstairs once my true station in life was discovered). As always on such walks I took my binoculars and camera just in case . I didn't expect three lifers! The first is a bit of a cheat. Monkey-puzzle is found on the upper slopes of Leith Hill, looking terribly naturalised - this species appears listed in the botanists bible Stace , so I'm having it. The second is a commonly naturalised plant that I must have walked past time and time again - Shallon. There are virtual forests of the stuff at Leith Hill. The third tick was a little more pukka, being an 18-spot Ladybird found by my eldest daughter Rebecca as we sat...

The thin slither of silver that you can see in the centre of the picture above is the sea. No big deal to you, maybe, but to me this was one of those golden moments. I was standing in Surrey and I could see the sea! There was something about that which was rather special. Squint as I might, but I couldn't make out any seabird passage, although it was a bit hazy. Also the 30 mile distance may not have helped. I think the gap in the South Downs that allows us Surreyites to get a salty sea view is where the River Adur empties itself into the Channel at Shoreham. But I maybe wrong. Where was I? Leith Hill.