My sadness at 'sterile' fields and when silence is far from golden.

Day two of my Million Steps Challenge saw me catching the train to Manningtree Station to pick up from where I left off on dayone. The day was grey, but no hold ups on the train and I arrived in Manningtree at 08.55. I walked down from the station to the hedge-lined route across the grassland towards Flatford. I knew it was going to be a different type of route to day one, from the wide open estuary to the grasslands and meadows and farmland of the Stour Valley, however what I wasn’t prepared for was the real contrast in scenery  between the two days.  

Firstly was the butter cup filled area that was obviously a chunk of land used for draining the railway, and gloriously opposite was also butter cup rich meadow, Buttercups were a big feature of day two of my MSC (million steps challenge). I don’t know if was the cold wet winter that has made them thrive or just that I was fortunate to hit the right time of year but there was certainly a massively impressive, golden show. Instantly I was taken back to my childhood, do you remember putting a flower under your chin to see if you liked butter? I continued on the track when a horse box came passed from the local farm with a young labrador  puppy running after it and beseeching the driver to ‘wait for me’ or ‘take me with you please.’ Then the pup saw me come back into the road from standing aside and in true cartoon-style he screeched to a halt in total surprise and fear, legs akimbo then bolted back towards the farm, looking behind him as he ran, so, so funny. As I neared the farm gate he had regained his composure and started barking like the grown up dog he aspired to; which was fine till I turned round and took a step back towards him, you should have seen him turn tail and run! I could have happily played this game for ages but I had plenty more steps ahead of me so instead I left the ‘brave dog’ to his own devices.

Passing under the Railway, I came across several large Oaks and looking left, the broom was in full display on the railway track,  a truly impressive display it brought to mind the poem ‘Oh to be in England’ by Robert Browning.

Oh, to be in England

Now that April's there,

And whoever wakes in England

Sees, some morning, unaware,

That the lowest boughs and the brushwood sheaf

Round the elm-tree bole are in tiny leaf,

While the chaffinch sings on the orchard bough

In England - now!

And after April, when May follows,

And the whitethroat builds, and all the swallows!

Hark, where my blossomed pear-tree in the hedge

Leans to the field and scatters on the clover

Blossoms and dewdrops - at the bent spray's edge -

That's the wise thrush; he sings each song twice over,

Lest you should think he never could recapture

The first fine careless rapture!

And though the fields look rough with hoary dew

All will be gay when noontide wakes anew

The buttercups, the little children's dower

- Far brighter than this gaudy melon-flower! Robert Browning 1812--1889

Musing this poem throughout my walk, I thought how spring this tear is at least 20 days late, its brought all of nature out in blossom together - an amazing sight, I wondered what Browning would have made of today’s vista. As I continued down the hedge lined route for the first ¾ mile it was a cacophony of sight and sound. Young rabbits darting across the path obviously living in the base of the huge thick hedgerows, the type where livestock have been grazing for years, cut back now but originally a well laid hedge giving it depth and structure before the invention of the flail. The birdsong was tremendous, white throat, blackcap, gold and chaffinch, blue and great tits, robin, and dunnock to name but a few.

Over the sound, and in the distance, the unmistakable sound of the Cuckoo, one of four I would hear this day. A bird, loved and loathed for its practice of laying eggs in others nests but imagine how hard this must be, as a cuckoo would have to lay about 8—10 eggs a whole clutch, in the right nest at the right time, too early and it would be ignored, too late it wouldn’t be incubated so it must surely be a stressful time, but what an excellent example of evolution and adaption. Imagine a spring without the cuckoo. They are suffering badly here and in the wintering grounds and subject of a big study by the British Trust for Ornithology. They are radio tagging birds and tracking them by satellite back to Africa and building up quite a picture which will be essential for their conservation. I wonder if one of the four I heard during my walk was a tagged bird. I recorded a bit of the cuckoo in the distance(click on the video above).

Today’s walk was all about birds and other wildlife, I was literally surrounded by them. The key formulae were all here. Hedges and vegetation, nesting habitat, grass, grazing animals, water, trees and essentially insects from all those mixed together. It was so striking, the sound and sight of nature, it really was a pleasure to walk.  Once I reached the sluces before Flatford I was treated to sight of a pair of Turtle Doves, a bird that had declined by 98% in the UK. Just think when was the last time you hear the distinctive call of the turtle dove? I bet it was a while ago, unless you were listening out for it I suspect.

I stopped at Flatford for a couple of reasons; one to look at the RSPB Flatford garden.

This was a project started when I was still Director of the Region for the RSPB. It was a legacy specifically for the RSPB, and the only choice was to make it something which I hoped complemented what the other organisations at Flatford were doing. At the time a climate change proof Suffolk garden seemed to fit the bill. I am pleased to report it looks fabulous and therefore a big well done to Mark Nowers and his team of jolly volunteers for making it such a success. I also met with Tim McGregor the Property Manager at National Trust Flatford. I suppose I am unique here having been Regional Director for both RSPB and National Trust. It was great to see Tim again and catch up on what is happening at Flatford and the area, a property which always has a special place in my heart.

Declining the offer of coffee, I felt I had only walked a short distance I strode out across the grass meadows towards Dedham. The cattle were interested to see me. I love cattle, I know some people aren’t fans but they are such great beasts, I love their eyes, their inquisitiveness and the smell and sound. Some stopped to look I stopped and wondered who was looking at who!  I got an investigatory lick from one. I love how if you touch their nose it is a delayed reaction before the move back, its great fun, touch their nose and count the seconds before you get a reaction.

Continuing on I saw two ladies walking their dogs and a runner panting by, little did I realise these were to be my only company for the rest of the walk. The fields all around me were packed with buttercups, a green wood pecker yaffled away from me, gold finches and sky larks in front of me and butterflies abound.  Arriving at the road to Dedham I crossed and continued my way towards the A12 underpass. The Stour, full of water and very reflective, showing off the blossom in a fantastic mirrored image with the folly sitting by the river, simply beautiful. Interestingly, as you leave Dedham you start to pick up the noise of the A12, increasingly so as you near it obviously. I went through the underpass and joined, what originally would have been the old A12, now a vegetated edge quiet road. Past some amazing old wood framed building, I always wonder how some of these are still stand, bent and knarled as they are but always worth a look as there are some amazing carvings on the doors and porches, 

Crossing a small bridge, I went across another grass meadow obviously grown for hay, continuing the grass meadow theme of the pre-A12 walk. This time though I noticed immediately this was a commercial Italian rye seed mix not a wild flower mix. The grasses were seeding so it would be cutting time shortly but it was noticeable that there were no flowers in the mix. We have lost 97% of our flower meadows in the UK a shocking figure, but wonderful that the Queen has chosen this year, her 60^th year since her coronation, to make her mark with conservation via the regeneration of our flower meadows, creating 60 flower-rich meadows for generations to come.  

After walking past a fishing lake, the journey landscape changed. It changed in two ways; 1.) It became industrial farmland, but that gave me a chance to spot glacial and interglacial features and 2.) Nature became sparser and quieter.

As you’ll know I’m sure, there were approx. four main glaciations that affected the Eastern Counties of England. I have over simplified this for this blog but basically the ice reached London for the first, Essex for the second, Ipswich for the third, and the north Norfolk coast for the fourth. The ice sheets Kms thick affected us by planning the landscape and diverting rivers, depositing sands, gravels and tills over the landscape then re working that and re depositing each time. In between times there were warmer periods when the landscape was very important for ancient peoples and wildlife such as Hippos in the Thames, which of course was a tributary of the Rhine at that time, Lions, Hyena e.t.c. and Woolly Rhino and Elephants in the cooler periods. Evidence for this is still being found by geologists and archaeologists both of which in Suffolk we are well blessed with.

Features such as out wash channels, gravel based rivers, ice depressions and wind-blown sands e.t.c. are easily seen on the coast but these are also visible in the farmed landscape if you look. The undulating Suffolk countywide is a product of this process. The Suffolk clays, the gravels and the flints all due to the ice age reworking of the land.

There is a photo of an old outwash channel and subsequent stream below seen near Stoke by Nayland. In the fields and particularly good where potatoes are grown as the farmer moves the stones as he is planting with the machinery you can find flint Sea Urchins, worm burrows, Belemites squid like creatures, and the like; these have been replaced by flint in the chalky seas they lived 100—125 million years ago. You also find flits that have been rolled by the glaciers forming cannon ball flints as well as frost shattered and acid altered flints showing how harsh these landscapes were. What’s great is its all here to see as you walk through the countryside. For more indepth information check out the Suffolk Geosite or RIGS web site. 

So having had my head down looking for fossils I suddenly became aware of a mist. Was it raining? No it was an irrigator watering the potatoes, only trouble is it was irrigating the footpath as well! I had to time my run by once the spray had flicked left, it then moved back and I had to run ahead of the spray to keep dry. Trouble was the vegetation had been soaked and of course I brushed passed it all and got totally soaked - the water was running down the inside of my trousers!!

I understand the farmers have to irrigate their crops and I imagine I’m somehow to blame - afterall as a society  we are driven by the supermarkets to want potatoes all the same shape and size,  therefore the farmer is forced to deliver on these demands. As I walked I thought this must take its toll, he is constantly monitored by the supermarkets to get the right crop we allegedly want and therefore nature is constantly eroded with industrial farming and pesticide/herbicide sprays.

For a farmer to accomplish what we want he has to ‘sterilise’ the field. No ‘weeds’ (or wild flowers to you and me), no insects, and no crop damage. You are left with mono cultures of insect free, weed free crops, totally uninteresting and dead to life.

 I have to ask the question is this really what we want from our countryside? We have to work with farmers to give us more at the same time allowing them to be a profitable business; you and I have to demand that of our supermarkets and farmers.  It is lazy to blame food shortages and world famine; at the moment there is more than enough food in the world it is just in the wrong place so it’s a logistics issue and we need to stop throwing over 40% of our food away because we buy too much and let it go bad in our homes.

OK here endeth the lesson, but it will come back, in one of my future blogs.

Next, I crossed barley fields and through some more grassland with two pairs of displaying and calling lapwing, exhibiting all the characteristics of protecting young, I hope so, lapwing have also declined massively in our increasingly dry landscapes.

After crossing the road to Stoke-by-Nayland  near Torrington Hall a National Trust Tudor wooden framed house - a must see if you are on this road.

 You can hire the house if you fancy it! Crossing the road you go up to what can only be described as an adventure lane. It starts off as a cart track, in fact you can see the tractor tracks where the farmer had been up to see the crops, it then narrows after a small turn to the right then left, and it becomes a real old Suffolk Green Lane. With its high banks, once laid and coppiced, note the the stools at the base of the hedge many hundred years old, an art we have lost to the flail in modern times. Walking up this green lane you can practically hear the ghosts of the old farm hands maintaining the hedges, the women carrying baskets of produce with children running and playing down the lane. Ok I romanticise for a while but, these green lanes were arteries for local people going from village to village or on their way to market. A fantastic lane allows you to really use your imagination to go back in time. Again it reminds me of Ronald Blythe books, a must if you haven’t read any. I was reminded only the other day that he is still alive and about to publish a new book.

However there is a downside to this; I stopped to overlook the countryside from this great vantage point and I was struck by one thing - the silence. Total silence, broken only by a single bird calling at times. Now I like silence, love it in fact, but here it is an indication just how sterile our countryside is now and I am sad about that.

I walked on eating an apple and stopped again to overlook a small hamlet of wooden framed houses and barns and at last I was conscious of a buzzing noise. I did wonder If it was the ‘Hum‘ that so many people say they can here in the modern world, I don’t hear it myself, much too much tinnitus I suspect, but I could hear this buzz. I narrowed it down to a lone holly tree in flower. Being a holly it is tall and had been allowed to grow up above hedge height. It was in flower and those flowers, like an oasis in the desert, were being served by bees and other insects in huge numbers. Again I recorded the buzz, click on this video and turn up the volume it’s great J

Moving on, I joined the Stour River again; now a much smaller beast than pre-A12 but flowing well at a farm complex. Again great historic buildings, you climb up and down dale, as they say, over the outwash gravels, certainly gets the heart rate up a bit and who said Suffolk was flat! These lanes and paths would be a perfect setting for period dramas, no road tyre tracks no pylons looking like they could be the lanes of the 18^th century.

Climbing up over sheep pasture, the grasses and sorrel,  the rabbits and the gorse and coming down to a small lane that eventually leads up into Stoke-by-Nayland opposite the Crown Public House! I have stayed here before with some members of RSPB council when taking them on a tour of Suffolk I can recommend the beer, the food, and the accommodation, but no time to call in today, I needed to catch a bus back to Colchester station.

At the bus stop by the village hall stop and savour the great view of one of Constables favourite churches. It appears in several of his works, mostly out of context to where it is it seems, as was his wont at times. Why not? I totally align with his thinking, in your mind’s eye when you are day- dreaming or thinking, you bring back all bits of your life’s experiences and in the microseconds your brain works in, you see all sorts of things, views, and people. It’s what keeps us sane despite T.E. Lawrence saying

All men dream: but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds wake in the day to find that it was vanity: but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act their dreams with open eyes, to make it possible.

Keep having good thoughts of views, sounds, tastes and people it is good for you and your mental health.

The double decker bus arrived  (only 5 mins. late) and took me back to Colchester station for the train back to Norwich. I completed 27166 steps which is 13.6 miles and by the time I got home it was 30937 steps in total - so a good day stepping out as part of my Million Steps Challenge. I have now walked over 400000 steps so I’m well on my way to my target in fact at this rate it might be 2 million! J  Watch out for my next adventure in a couple of weeks’ time again I have added a bird list for those that do.

Until next time,

Richard P

Bird list

Skylark	Tree sparrow	Cuckoo
Bullfinch	Green finch	White throat
Chaffinch	Collared dove	Black cap
Goldfinch	Turtle dove	Willow warbler
Blue tit	Red shank	Common gull
Great tit	Egret	Black headed gull
Dunnock	Shoveller	Common Tern
House sparrow	Shelduck	Kestral
Reed warbler	Sedge warbler	Reed bunting
Meadow pipit	yellow wagtail	Green woodpecker
Gt spotted woodpecker	Lapwing	Kingfisher
Crow	Rook	Wood pigeon
Song thrush	Blackbird	Swallow
Swift	House martin	Sand martin
Mallard	Wren	Robin
Jackdaw	Jay	Coot
Moorhen	Pheasant	Hobby