NORTH DOWNS & BEYOND

Any wander with a camera results in plenty of pictures being taken - those old enough to remember the days of film will recall how careful we were when taking a photograph, as each attempt was using up a precious exposure on the roll. Now, we can snap away without such fear - hence lots of images can go missing, get forgotten or languish in a folder on a computer's desktop. Here are four I've rescued from the past week... Great Spotted Woodpecker at Canons Farm  Young Robin in the back garden after having taken a bath in the pond Green Hairstreak along Chipstead Bottom, one of several seen Fly Orchids, Chipstead Bottom, more spikes starting to flower

May 4th? It feels more like March 4th, all low scudding grey clouds with a definite chill to the air. I did attempt a bit of birding, but apart from a handful of 'scratchy' Whitethroats it was all quite poor. However, I had something up my sleeve just in case the birds were being difficult - a local colony of Fly Orchids. In the Banstead area it is not a common plant by any means. I have been told of a 'sizeable' colony that I have searched for, but yet to find (I know the wood, but it's quite large), so I stuck with my regular patch which are in Chipstead Bottom, tucked away under a Yew tree. I counted 23 spikes (the most that I've seen here), and two of them had started to flower.

Last Saturday, with Dungeness stuck in a nagging, cool, NNE wind, the observatory faithful abandoned ship mid-afternoon and went into the narrow green lanes of east Kent in search of orchids. With Gill H at the wheel, Dave W with the map and David C about to be assaulted by things with leaves (rather than feathers), our first stop was Park Gate Down, home to the Monkey Orchid. Would they be out yet? The answer was a firm "No". This was the most forward of the lot, and there were only a dozen to choose from. Some compensation was on offer with over 1,000 Early Purple Orchids at their best, with two of them being pure white in flower. David C started to fidget so went off and located a Marsh Tit. Next stop was the marvellously meandering reserve at Yockletts. By now the late afternoon was turning into a calm, bright evening. The scene was set and the orchids put on a fine show. First up were at least 50 Fly Orchids, all in good flower. This diminutive plant is a fav...

... almost literally. Both from this morning, and both from Chipstead Bottom - Green Hairstreak (top) and Fly Orchid (bottom).

The sun was out and the cold northerly wind was a little less bothersome. My walk from home across Canons Farm, along Chipstead Valley and back to Banstead via Park Downs was more about looking into the future then observing the here and now. I stopped to check on the Fly Orchids at Fame's Rough and found a minimum of four rosettes (above). I'm assuming that they are indeed what I am claiming them to be, as my vegetative ID skills are not, I admit, brilliant. As I always do when finding myself on Park Downs, I visited the orchid fields. Even though we are a few months away from flowering, I cannot help but go and bathe in the wonder of what these fields produced last year - it will stay with me forever. So although the scene today was as above, before long it will look like this... And to counterbalance the title of this post, a paragraph about what has been . I'm obviously in a reflective state of mind at the moment. As is my want, yesterday afternoon I left...

Fly Orchid at Yockletts Bank in Kent - one of the better ones 665. The number of Bee-eaters that Martin Casemore has missed at Dungeness this spring? How many managers Tottenham Hotspur have employed in the past 10 years? Or is it the number of plant species that I have taken photographs of in the UK? Yes, proving that I've got more time on my hands than is healthy, I counted up the number of plant species that I've photographed across the UK. Most (but not all) are half-decent, some have come out rather well and a few of them are just record shots (have you tried taking a photograph in pouring rain and force 6 winds on top of a Scottish mountain?) With thousands of images just resting on a hard-disk, waiting to be opened and looked at irregularly, I thought it would be worthwhile letting them out into the big wide world. So, if you (or somebody you know) wants to use any of them for personal means, to illustrate a talk or presentation, or just use as wallpaper for y...