Category Natural history group walks
Return to Pixton
Every year we manage to make at least one visit to Pixton Meadow in the village, not least because it is such a delightful and popular spot. As we have noted before, meadows have seriously declined over the last 70 years so it is great to see even this example of what in the past […]
Creatures of the soil
A couple of weeks ago two of us visited Minepits wood at Tablehurst for a natural history group meeting devoted to the animals of leaf litter and the soil. Though we’ve been recording species at the farm for the past couple of years, almost all of the creatures that have been observed have been above […]
New Year Plant Hunt
This New Year was the sixth time the Botanical Society of Britain and Ireland organised a plant hunt. Its objective is to record any (non-planted) species in flower around and just after 1 January. This has proved to be considerably interesting since it has provided a stark indication that many more plants are flowering in […]
Rocky II
After our last rockpooling adventure, there was definitely some keenness to do it again. However, the main challenge at this time of year is finding a date; you need a good low tide (ie a spring, rather than a neap, tide) which falls within daylight hours, ideally not at dawn, and preferably at the weekend. […]
Pixton Meadow
The main focus of today’s walk was the lovely meadow at Pixton, just north of Emerson college. It is looking great at the moment, so it was an ideal opportunity to focus on a particular habitat that is only 30 minutes’ walk from the centre of the village. Though there were plenty of other things […]
Dawn chorus walk
Mercifully, the weather didn’t turn out to be as bad as the forecast suggested when we gathered at 5.30am for a (slightly late(ish)) dawn chorus walk on International Dawn Chorus Day. It was still a bit drizzly, but that soon eased off and we ended up having a fascinating walk along the Forest Way led […]
The importance of looking
Back in March a small group of us cycled along the Forest Way to look at the pond near Hartfield (TQ47163599). It was rather cold and not the most species-rich outing we have had. However, with such meagre pickings we ended up looking very closely at small things growing on the willows. In addition […]
Spring at Tablehurst
The weather forecast really wasn’t very good, and I had expectations of no-one else turning up, but happily there was no rain, even if it was a bit overcast and chilly. So, five of us managed to have a very short walk through the farm looking out for birds, spring plants and some invertebrates. Heading […]
A cold day in March on the Forest Way
When we planned a cycle ride along the Forest Way we were hoping for some nice early spring sunshine, find some basking snakes and various small creatures starting to come alive as the temperature starts to rise. However, only a small group of us ventured out on what was really rather a cold Sunday afternoon […]
Common woodland bryophytes
I appreciate that mosses and liverworts probably don’t have the same appeal as birds or bees, so it wasn’t that surprising that we had a smaller group on our bryo walk. It was also on a Sunday morning, and the weather didn’t look that promising, but it did mean that we could have a focussed […]
Nature's book 