Over the last twenty years our group has travelled the two and a half miles through Sussex farmland and woods. During this time, we have recorded the birds and charted how their populations have changed. Our group gradually changes and individuals often return. Our walk takes us through nightingale country over a golf course and into varied countryside where skylarks and pipits are plentiful.
Each month produces surprises. Through the winter months with corvids and raptors present, to the small migrants coming in Spring, the route displays interesting fauna and flora and as well as interesting birds.
We have kept most of the nightingales, lost the lesser spotted woodpecker, marsh tit and willow warblers on the way, but gained buzzards and now ravens!
The change of terrain allows us to predict birds we will see at the next stage. Treecreepers are to be found on the oak with the five-metre girth. Yellowhammers can be repeatedly seen in the high hedges of meadows and there is always a possibility of a kingfisher on a nearby pond.
The walk also produces wonderful vistas of the Downs to the south, as well as fruitful walks through the autumn hedgerows. Spindle, sloes and bush plums, hips and haws add to the pleasure of the late walks.
As we approach the village through the Common new birds emerge. The Common has reed warblers and reed buntings and walking into the village, we see our first colony of house sparrows.