The Burgh

Wisps of cloud like strands of a wise sage's hair hang loosely across a powder blue sky, as the river Arun glitters below like a necklace of silver. The chill of the winter morning has been usurped by an afternoon snatched from spring. 

Peppering Farm stands in splendid isolation above Burpham, secreted in a hollow in centre of the South Downs. Time stands still here where the roads ends, wide field margins and thick hedgerows sing with life, and below Arundel castle is cradled in the nook of the river.

When I first came to the Downs some fifteen years ago an old sign, burnt at one corner by a pyromaniac delinquent boasted that if I was very lucky I might see a buzzard here. These short years later I am surprised if I don't see the eagle-like silhouette riding the thermals across remote fields. Today twitchers gather in a small car park huddle, scopes peering out across the coombe. Somewhere here a rough legged buzzard  is wintering. In most years as few as five of these magnificent raptors visit the United Kingdom, and birders from far and wide have scanned the coombe, trying to pick out which of the four or five buzzards that soar above is the one they need for their tick list.

He appears as I reach the triangle of copse that forms the Burgh proper. A covey of grey partridge are flushed from the hedge row, in turn startling a flock of fieldfares. Dunnock patrol the hedgerows, nervously twitching their wings as they feed. 

Across the coombe all eyes are on the rough legged buzzard, I turn north east towards Rackham Banks, and from the neighbouring field the unmistakable chatter of a sparrowhawk fills the air, and the copse erupts with alarm calls. 

A tractor pulls up and a genial farmer chats about the buzzards, a marked contrast to the iron lady who, not far from here at a local private estate pulled up in her expensive car to chastise me for walking on the wrong side of the footpath not long ago. 


Here on this farmer's land much has been done to improve the lot of the local wildlife, and a sign at the entrance proudly proclaims a list of species to be seen here. 


The ancient flint trackway, polished by thousands of years of hoof and foot, starts to glisten as the sun turns the sky the colour of hot coals. Arundel Castle turns purple and then mauve in the haze and on the horizon the sea burns as the sun slowly sinks below the surface.

01.01.12

A cloud base of 500ft changes plans for a high level walk on Rackham Banks to a misty stroll around  Pulborough Brooks.

In the car park a robin sings for his breakfast and fearlessly snatches his reward from outstretched fingers, before doing a new year jig among the hawthorn.

Several mark territories around the reserve, singing a more plaintive song than in the summer, conspicuous in the winter stripped hedgerows.

West Mead is flooded and a fleet of canada geese set sail with an escort of wigeon, anxiously scanning the skies, perhaps wary of the merlin that passed by shortly before I reached the hide.

Black fallow deer huddle in numbers, exposed in the field centre, as the cloud thickens and lowers and causal visitors hurry by in seek of shelter.

Several redwing make exploratory dashes from dense thicket cover to pick at fields for worms bought to the surface by the recent heavy rains. Their nervous dashes have the watcher glassing the skies for the small and agile merlin , to no avail.

Bank holiday twitchers line a viewing point, drawn here by it's view of the peregrine's regular perch. The male, the tiercel, mocks their impatient waiting by flying high and wide behind and out of view of their expectant spotting scopes. Soon heavy rain will drive them into the cafes and pubs and he will resume his perch, untroubled by admirers.

A grey squirrel breaks cover and busies himself looking for beech nuts, a convenient tree allows for approach close enough to hear the shell being systematically cracked in hungry teeth, his concentration so fully on the delights within it seems possible to reach out and pinch the morsel from his paws.

A crescendo of noise announces arrival at Nettleys, where several hundred wigeon patrol wetland banks, gorging on grasses and roots. In the rushes a grey heron maintains sentry in a stand of beige reedmace, a silent, still assassin, waiting patiently for his victim to pass through.

Out on the flooded meadows black tailed godwit, lapwing, shelduck and ruff fight for space, taking to the skies in a cacophony of noise at the slightest hint of the presence of the peregrine. Comical looking shoveler, spatulate beaks looking so heavy that they should surely sink this ungainly creature, mine sweep in channels and ditches, while moorhen wobble along banks in search of a morsel of worm.

A mallard and his partner engage in a brief mating session hard by the bank, he nods and passes by, she nods back, and he nods again before mounting his amour, fortunately briefly as she sinks under his enthusiastic attention. They wash feathers immediately and Casanova turns his attention to a second female who enters his pond.

Comedy is provided by an antlered black fallow deer wearing a crown of shrubbery among his antlers, his teenage-like posing in front of disinterested females monitored closely by an older, more fully antlered adult. When the youngster slowly and carefully pursues a young female into nearby woodland it is not long before the older male follows suit, as if to chaperon the errant member of his harem and her pubescent suitor.

The females look on, unmoved, and huddle tighter against rain that falls in cold steel rods.

A walk back down wooded avenues reveals a treat in a trio of jays, normally shy a solitary male perches on a post, briefly shed of inhibition he croaks a winter tune before retreating among his friends in high branches.

A bullfinch sits on a branch singing, his red suit and mournful song reminiscent of a drunk wending his way home from hogmanay celebrations long since finished.