I hope all of you and your families are staying well and have had a chance to enjoy some walks over the Easter holiday. Thank you to all who kindly commented on my post last week- very much appreciated.
I have been enjoying some great local walks this week, After Easter, I decided to set my alarm for my usual ‘work time’ wake up- 6.15am just to make sure that I did not get out of the practice of getting up early. It was well worth it on a sunny frosty morning the fields were deserted.
Although our area has changed much since Victorian times and certainly in the last 20 years or so, there are lots of clues of a previous ancient landscape, we talk about ancient woodland being 400 years old and if you look closely along some boundaries there are signs of ancient woodland which are probably the remnants of a much more forested landscape. The hedgerow between Attenborough’s fields and the Paddock Road allotments is a good example of this, look closely along here and you can see an old bank and ditch, much smaller now as it was eroded over hundreds of years and you will see ancient woodland species like Lords and Ladies (cuckoo pint) and bluebell (see photos below). These species take centuries to naturally colonise the woodland floor so you won’t see them in new or secondary woodland (unless humanly planted).
Carrying onward along this boundary through the grove of oaks which are the remnants of the more wooded landscape, before being turned into the grazed parkland of today. These oaks or to be precise Pedunculate oak trees are quite beautiful when in flower with the long golden catkins contrasting with the new and fresh lime coloured leaves.
The field that sticks out to the west (on your right) is Little Brickfield, this is a clue of the heavy London clay beneath- claggy mud in winter and hard as concrete in summer. A friend I met in the fields recently told me her family call it the ‘festival field’ as she thinks it would be the perfect spot for a small music festival- a nice thought. I wondered if anyone else has their own family names for parts of the fields.
Anyway, it really is a beautiful field and being surrounded by thick and high hedges means it is very sheltered and feels like a much more rural location with lovely views looking due east and south. It’s a tremendous field for wildlife and in the early morning was filled with birdsong, song thrush, blackbird, chiffchaff, wren, robin, blackcap, however, the star for me is a long distant migrant which has arrived recently after wintering in tropical Africa. The adult males song is a beautiful shimmering and descending phrase about 3 seconds long and repeated every 10 seconds or so- something like sisisi vuw-vuw-vuw. If you get a moment to listen online, it’s wonderful!
Willow Warbler- Photo courtesy of The Wildlife Trusts
If you walk through Little Brickfield you will exit near the Greenway. If you follow this due west (turn right) have a look at the last small field before you reach Oxhey Lane. This is probably one of the ancient and unimproved grasslands in the area i.e it hasn’t been ploughed or fertilized for centuries, you can tell this by the flowers found especially in mid-summer, I call it the Betony field, a scarce wildflower found there in June, another of my favourites. This time of year it looks quite ordinary but life is stirring and is covered with this modest plant, Field Wood-rush or Good Friday grass which gives a clue when it ‘flowers’. It was used in olden times by farmers as a guide when they could bring their animals out into the fields to graze after a long winter in barns.
Good Friday grass and dandelion Merry Hill WT reserve
Rob Hopkins (FOAF)
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