NORTH DOWNS & BEYOND

Priest Hill. Until the Second World War it was north Surrey farmland, a mix of arable (wheat, barley, oats and potatoes) with a small herd of Jersey cows that were used for milking. A demand for the payment of death duties meant that the owners were forced to sell, which in 1942 brought in the tidy sum of £100,000 from Surrey and London County Councils. The farm was demolished in 1956 which then lead to the building of Ewell Technical College and the creation of playing fields for the use of Tulse Hill School, used to service its 2,000+ pupils, who were bussed in from South London. When Tulse Hill closed in 1990 the playing fields, changing rooms, tennis courts and cricket nets were abandoned to vandals, graffiti artists, fly tippers, travellers, glue sniffers, motor bike off-roaders... and me. I used to wander across the fast vegetating land, a vast open wasteland, to see what alien plants were springing up and what (few) birds I could find. A bit of the land was saved (Glyn Schoo...

Somewhere in deepest north Surrey is a chalky earth bank where Shepherd's-needle is just starting to flower. The site is not one where it naturally occurs, so anybody just about to twist my arm for the location can calm down. Such sowing of rare plants may be contentious, but when the seed is taken from British plants at sites that are under threat, then I believe such actions are sensible and worthy. The only place that I have seen this species in the wild is at Portland Bill in Dorset, back in 2000.