May 10, 2025 by ammcculloch49

Bluebells 2025 – the winner!

The season is now over. It was as beautiful as ever at its peak, but this year the dry weather and maybe the cold wind, were not conducive to the bloom’s longevity. Last weekend at Ide Hill and Emmetts Garden the bluebells were gorgeous but already well on the wane. In fact at Ide Hill, brambles have taken over some of the areas where once bluebells thrived. Some of my favourites this year were at the top of Wilmot’s Hill near Ightham Mote; but what has struck me in recent weeks is how pretty bluebells are when mingled with other flowers – notably cuckoo flowers, red campion and stitchwort – at the foot of hedgerows. The Bough Beech walk has some of my favourite examples, Underriver too. Oh yes, and below Polhill Bank on the path to Sepham Farm, where you are likely to be serenaded by yellowhammers (that’s a bird by the way, not a construction tool).

New Year’s Wood, Cudham
New Year’s Wood, Cudham
Emmett Gardens
Wild garlic and bluebells, Emmett
Emmett Gardens
Scord Wood, near Ide Hill
Ide Hill 2025
Wilmott Hill bluebells
Cuckoo flowers and bluebells near Bore Place, Bough Beech
Wood anemones and early bluebells, Andrew’s Wood, near Shoreham
Lullingstone

So, to the winner and runners-up of the annual Kent Walks Near London bluebell competition:

New Year’s Wood, Cudham chalk paths walk
Hedgerow bluebells, Bough Beech walk
Top of Wilmot’s Hill, One Tree Hill figure of eight walk

Last year’s winner, the Blueberry Lane meadow, at Knockholt was obviously utterly stunning but the rules state that the same location can’t win the following year. I actually visited New Year’s Wood very early in the bluebell season, before they’d quite found their colour, but the seas of young flowers in the late afternoon sunlight were truly beguiling in that quiet, mysterious wood.

Please contact me with any omissions in my not particularly extensive bluebell research. The season only lasts a couple of weeks so it’s not always possible to get around all the walks to view them – I didn’t go to High Elms, Oldbury, Petts Wood, Meenfield Wood (recently scarred by timber work) or Lullingstone over the past month so no idea how good they were.

April 20, 2025 by ammcculloch49

Bluebells in north-west Kent: where’s best?

It’s fair to say the cobalt carpet has finally spread its magic in many of the woods covered in the KWNL area. Bluebells are now almost fully out on the North Downs chalk hills walks such as the Cudham stroll (in New Year’s Wood particularly), and the various Shoreham circular and Polhill routes. Alas, the timber work going on in Meenfield Wood above Shoreham (west side of valley) may hinder your enjoyment of bluebells there. Further south the Greensand Ridge walks at Underriver, One Tree Hill, Ide Hill (perhaps the best bluebells – so you won’t be alone), Oldbury and Hosey Common are awash with blue. Closest to south-east London, Beckenham Place Park, High Elms and Petts Wood-Hawkwood Estate (in the lower, damper parts) has several swathes too. The Downe walk mk1 doesn’t have a lot of bluebell action en route but a quick diversion down to Downe Bank (the west side of the Cudham valley) from point 3 or at the start of the walk should see you in the magical blue realm. Following the Downe Mk2 walk will be kind of blue too, particularly at Downe Bank and Blackbush and Twenty Acre Shaw woods. The Chiddingstone and Hever routes don’t have many bluebells I can confirm, not that this detracts from these superb strolls. (Pictured below: from 2022 and 2021 bluebells at New Year Wood on Cudham walk; Meenfield wood, Shoreham circular/Polhill routes; Ide Hill route)

New Year’s Wood, Knockholt/Cudham: early bluebells
New Years Wood bluebells
New Year’s Wood bluebells 2022
Bluebells on the Ide Hill walk in Scord Wood
Bluebells, Emmetts/Scords wood, 2017
Meenfield Wood, April 2022
Meenfield Wood, April 2022

Anyway, here are some bluebell factoids gleaned from an excellent article with far more detail called Bloomageddon: seven clever ways bluebells win the woodland turf war at The Conversation website.

They are uniquely adapted to suited the multispecies ancient woodlands of the UK
Low temperatures trigger their growth (but might delay their blooming if in April). Bluebell seeds germinate when the temperature drops below 10°C.
Bluebells predominantly convert sunlight into fructose allowing them to photosynthesise at low temperatures.
They are supreme competitors with other plants, allowing them to carpet woodland floors. But they get help in the form of mycorrhiza, a symbiotic fungi.
Almost half the world’s bluebells are found in the UK, they’re relatively rare in the rest of the world.

But please be careful never to tread on any; it takes bluebells years to recover from damage. Digging them up – surely no one visiting this site would consider such a thing – is illegal, and please don’t let dogs trample them either – keep them on the lead.

April 15, 2025 by ammcculloch49

Cuckoo birds and flowers on the Bore Place/ Bough Beech route

The little Bough Beech walk is one of those quiet ones: it doesn’t seem much but it creeps up on you and you realise you miss it if you haven’t done it for a while. The vast lake (described here) is a major spectacle at the beginning and end of the walk but doesn’t define the route; Bore Place, a delightfully hidden organic teaching farm and event venue, does. The walk is only two and a half miles (handy if you have a bad foot, as I do) to which you can add an hour‘s pop-in at the lovely nature reserve at the end, where there’s usually news of an interesting oiseaux or two keeping the friendly birders in the hide on their toes. Cuckoos (the star of this particular day), barn owls, kingfishers, migrating osprey are regularly seen here. On my recent walk here, as the fine pre-Easter weather started to break, interesting cloudscapes and shafts of sun reflected from the lake surface, while to the north the Greensand Ridge at Ide Hill and Goathurst Common were swept by very localised squalls. I was struck by how beautiful bluebells are when among cuckoo flowers; that was about as profound a thought I could muster while walking – which is how it should be. Back at home it was amazing to watch the simply incredible US Masters finale, though the football results did not bring me any comparable joy.

Trees in water, Bough Beech
North lake, Bough Beech
Cuckoo flowers and bluebells near Bore Place
North lake Bough Beech on a showery day
Bough Beech view of the Greensand Ridge

April 5, 2025 by ammcculloch49

Greening time and an early grass snake

To the accompanying sounds of chiffchaffs, blackcaps, wrens, tits, dunnocks and robins, I trekked the Polhill/Pluto route from Andrews Wood car park on Shackland Road. Suddenly there’s a sheen of green in the tree canopies; in fact there are canopies – not just stark branches – the colour scheme has seamlessly moved on from the gentle grey/browns of winter. Below the greening trees wood anemones and early bluebells are mixing with celandine, early cowslips, primroses and the odd cuckoo flower to add pixels of vibrant hues. I was delighted to spot a long, thin and beautifully patterned grass snake after hearing leaves rustling under a bush, but I couldn’t bring the camera to bear in time: damn autofocus! Slow worms were plentiful though, but you have to know where to look and avoid disturbing them. Buzzards took delight in the clear sky and subtle breezes. A fantastic walk.

View across the mouth of the Darent Valley from Polhill in early April
The greening of Meenfield Wood
Wood anemones and bluebells, Andrew’s Wood
Just blue sky and fresh foliage, Meenfield Wood
Gorse and early foliage across the valley from Meenfield Wood to Andrew’s Wood

April 1, 2025 by ammcculloch49

Circular walk sign confusion alert

It’s great to bump into walkers using my instructions; I can usually spot the pdfs a mile off! But it’s not so great when those walkers are lost … while cycling on Sunday I bumped into two intrepid hikers on Sunday in Downe. Unfortunately, they were trying to follow the Cudham Chalk Paths walk but had gone rather off piste. They had thought that the green and yellow signs for the much longer Cudham Circular walk, as advertised by Bromley Council and Long Distance Walks Association, were route markers for the more modest walk at KWNL. I was able to explain the error and direct them (hopefully) back towards Cudham but the thought that people were using existing signs to follow my walks was terrifying. Please don’t do that! There are no KWNL walks that have specific signposts; the routes are only here on this website.

March 23, 2025 by ammcculloch49

Rockin’ all over the Weald

The sandstone outcrops in and around Tunbridge Wells on the Kent High Weald are little remarked on yet are the most climbed rock formations in the country, given their proximity to London. A great walk can be done from Tunbridge Wells station out past Wellington Rocks on the common, through Happy Valley as far as High Rocks, taking in all of these wonderful, alien-looking formations that appear strangely out of place within the smooth contours of south-east England. Perhaps come back via Rusthall Common, and its Toad Rock. A bit further away, at Groombridge are Harrison’s Rocks, perhaps the most striking of all and easily reached from Tunbridge Wells by taking the Spa Valley railway.

Cheesewringer rock, Rusthall, Tunbridge Wells

The sandstone here is Ardingly sandstone – a different type of rock to the greensand (glaucite) further north on the ridge south of Sevenoaks (see Ide Hill, Underriver, Oldbury and One Tree Hill walks). There are also outcrops, though much smaller, on the Hever and Chiddingstone walks. Our walk last week, in delightful weather (sadly not available this weekend) took in the Cheesewring rocks south of Rusthall Common.

The origins of these rocks, which gained their characteristic cracks during the ice ages, lie in sediment of the Wealden Lake. This covered much of what is now SE England and northern France 145 million years ago. I’ll add a walk at some point to cover these superb spots.

Meanwhile, grey clouds returned this Sunday but it was great to see the fantastic magnolias in full bloom in Scords Wood, as it melds into Emmetts Garden on the Ide Hill walk. The distant fields and even Bough Beech reservoir appeared white in the odd light. I’ve never seen that effect before. It was unsettling. But still, a lovely walk.

(Photographs: Cheeswringer, Tunbridge Wells; magnolia at Emmetts Garden. Adam McCulloch, iphone images so not the best!)

March 6, 2025 by ammcculloch49

Change is afoot, it’s time to March

Now that there’s some prolonged sunshine, some of the humungous amounts of mud from February are beginning to dry up. ‘Some‘ being the operative word. Still, let’s welcome the bright weather, which is set to continue this weekend. Saturday could be a bumper day for Kent Walks near London but wellies are definitely still needed – because shaded mud patches will not have dried as yet, not even close. Early spring can be an odd time of year – the trees still appear brown and grey from a distance, though close-up you can see buds. Soon the blackthorn will flower – that’s when spring has sprung for me. Early March in good weather is a very particular time of year – it’s as if spring caught the natural world asleep, and it takes a little time to wake up. But already there’s more birdsong and a bumblebee or two getting busy. I particularly like the Ide Hill, One Tree Hill, Bough Beech and Hever walks at this time of year, the south-facing slope of the Greensand Ridge focuses the warmth and is protected from any cold easterly or northerly winds. You can’t help but feel a bit of optimism, despite you know, everything. The pictures below are from the Bough Beech, Petts Wood, Chevening, Ide Hill and One Tree Hill routes. I love the blackthorn. The featured picture for this post is the woods at Hever in late March. There’s a sheen of primrose and celandine on the woodland floor; I really like the photograph, I can remember every detail of that day.

Flooded woods, Bough Beech, March
March view over Brasted and Sundridge
Blackthorn blossom on One Tree Hill, Sevenoaks, Kent

May 26, 2024 by ammcculloch49

It’s time for Fackenden Down

The Fackenden Down walk in late May on a breezy sunny day cannot be bettered. This is the walk on this site with most rewilding going on and plenty of Kent Wildlife Trust-maintained land. The results are a good variety of wildflowers, including several orchid species and sainfoin, lots of butterflies, burnet moths and birds such as buzzards (very common), whitethroat (from May to September) and yellowhammer (if you’re lucky). Some ancient species of livestock such as highland cattle are often used to graze the grasses in small numbers. My route is brilliant, if I do say so myself, and easily accessible by train. There’s a great pub at the end of the walk too – the Samuel Palmer.

I love Magpie Bottom in particular, a sheltered secret feeling valley alive with flowers and great variety of tree foliage colours. Then there the views from Fackenden Down itself, the wild “garden“ along the foot of White Hill and the Down, the view of London and Essex from the high point at Romney Street … it’s terrific, and a good workout with a few steep sections. It comes in at around 12,500 steps.

The Kent Wildlife Trust is in need of volunteers to monitor its livestock. Also it’s looking for urgent donations to enable it to purchase more land at Polhill, across the valley from Fackenden, where it monitors and maintains similarly superb chalk hillside. I’ve diverted the donations to this site to the appeal, but please make sure you chip in.

May 6, 2024 by ammcculloch49

The inaugural ‘Bluebells of north-west Kent’ award goes to …

The inaugural KWNL bluebell award results are in, now that the bluebell season is drawing to a close. The judge (that’s me) has visited a number of sites renowned for their bluebells at this time of year and come to his decision, without seeking the opinions of others (I prefer it that way, for clarity of thought). First, let’s be honest, it’s been a slightly underwhelming field this year compared with previous years, when this competition wasn’t held. It’s pissed down with rain largely, the sun has generally refused to appear, and it’s been so windy that lots of branches have fallen in the woods disrupting the shimmering fields of azure and making the place look untidy generally.

4th PLACE – EMMETTS/SCORDS WOOD on the IDE HILL ROUTE

Emmetts Garden/Scord Wood was the strong favourite to be the winner given their popularity and reputation so it is something of a shock to see it down in fourth in 2024. The position of the flowers on the slope and the widely space trees help makes them easy to photograph nicely, especially with late afternoon sun casting long shadows – the perfect bluebell shot. However, it was grey and cold during my visit and there were a few too many bare patches – unlucky, but rather like an Ofsted inspection on the way day the usually impeccably behaved pupils have nicked the headmaster’s car and left it upside down on the cricket pitch. Beautiful of course, but somehow not quite up to usual levels of greatness. No trophy but Champions League nonetheless.

3rd PLACE – MEENFIELD WOOD ON SHOREHAM WEST ROUTES

Meenfield Wood on the various Shoreham/Polhill western Darent Valley routes was also expected to make the top two, but just fell short. The full inspection took place on a Saturday again heavy with cloud with approaching rain from the south. The lime green of the beeches coming into leaf contrasted with the blue flowers to make for a colourful sight despite the conditions. Splotches of stitchwort added to the jollity at times. Many might argue it was a worthy contender to win; and in another year it may have.

2nd PLACE – NEW YEAR’S WOOD, CUDHAM CHALK PATHS

Doing much better than expected this year was New Years Wood, on the Cudham circular route. A lovely, quiet woods without many paths to interrupt the swathes of blue. More mysterious feeling even than Meenfield and it was easier to imagine the bluebells somehow continuing for miles into the distance – you couldn’t see where they ended.

1st PLACE – BLUEBERRY LANE MEADOW, KNOCKHOLT POUND

Close to the Cudham circular and Chevening walks, this magical spot (view from the gate: no entry into field) was not considered a contender until the judge happened to cycle past it on Sunday 5 May. This grassy field dotted with outstanding oaks, one of which appears damaged by lightning or storm, had never previously attracted the judge’s attention. The flowers appeared a very dense dark blue instead of rather milky blue of the previous two entrants, perhaps because of some trick of the light. There was some consideration that it should not qualify because it’s not strictly speaking on one of the walks, but this was overruled eventually, as cycle routes at KWNL also count.

Submissions from One Tree Hill, Lullingstone, Ide Hill, Hever and Oldbury were received too late to be considered unfortunately. They also breached the judge’s criteria of “not too much mud”.

I think there’s good bluebell viewing until around 13 May, but the beginnings of the end are already visible, so good luck!
See my cycle routes at Plot A Route

May 3, 2024 by ammcculloch49

How to identify birds by their songs and calls

There are plenty of smartphone apps for this purpose but without knowing what you’re likely to see or hear software such as Merlin or Birdnet can mislead if used in isolation. I’m not an expert but birder and fellow Kent walker Dave most definitely is. I’ve never seen him use an app. He just stands in the middle of the path for ages building up an aural picture from the space around us. “Chaffinches somewhere in that oak 30 metres to the right; greenfinch behind us, maybe 200 metres, nuthatch flying to those conifers… look, there it is, mistle thrush down low …” I find it quite annoying to be honest. But it’s a remarkable display of skill, patience and knowledge built up over years.

What doing the odd walk with Dave has taught me is that it’s best to learn a few calls of birds you are likely to see/hear and then, once you are familiar with them, start adding other likely species. Some, robin, blue and great tits, blackbird, you can learn from the garden or park. Cuckoo is obvious and one you can hear this month and in June on the Ide Hill, Chiddingstone and Hever walks in particular. Greenfinch is very distinctive too and dead easy to pick up once you know its chatter and “wheeze” – similar but different enough to more common goldfinch. You hear it more in parks and gardens though than on the KWNL walks.

*Wren – one of our smallest, but loudest birds. Photo: Wikimedia Commons*

It took me ages to realise that wrens were incredibly loud and identifiable; I’ve got that one down now, along with song thrush, greenfinch, chaffinch, long tailed tits, chiff chaff, blackcap, coal tit, goldcrest, and most recently, nuthatch. I’ve no idea what dunnocks sound like, so I better give that a listen, and treecreeper too. Bullfinch is a toughie because you really have to listen out for their weird “rusty gate”-like whistle and toots. Yellowhammer is easy. To see one of these I recommend the hedgerows on the Polhill route, once down on the valley floor; Fackenden Down hedges; the Eastern Valley walk and the Chevening walk. A great one to listen for now is common whitethroat. These have arrived from Africa now and are filling our hedgerows with song; they sound a bit like their cousins the blackcap but less rich and burbling. There are loads of other, less common, summer visitors to tick off, which all may be encountered on a walk at KWNL – willow warbler has a lovely song, nightingale obviously, garden warbler… Cetti’s warbler is startlingly loud and a bird that sings disconcertingly close to you but from deep inside a thorny dense bush, so you can’t see it.

So, I’d say use a combination of memory and app to recognise birdsong. Use the RSPB site and British Birdsongs to learn two or three bird species at a time, then use one of the smartphone apps to record and analyse what you hear – having listened out for the birds you’ve tried to memorise. It doesn’t seem easy at first but pretty soon you’ll start recognising the patterns. After all, it’s just music in another form and the difference between a chiffchaff and a wren will soon be as obvious as between Dua Lipa and, say, Raye. Or Chaka Khan and Whitney Houston. Or Teena Marie and Cindy Lauper. Or George Benson and Philip Bailey; Luther Vandross and Maurice White. I could go on, and would quite like to.