A family day out on the chalk: short walks, picnics and things to spot
Planning a summer family day round Lilley, Offley and King's Walden: short walks with children, stiles and cattle, picnic manners, butterflies and ticks.
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Every piece so far, newest first: walks, history, the old churches, gardens and the life of the hedges.
Pieces
Reading an OS Explorer map on the Chiltern edge
How to read an OS Explorer map around Lilley, Offley and King's Walden: rights of way symbols, contours on gentle chalk, grid references and bearings.
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Choosing binoculars for birding on open farmland
8x42, 10x42 or 8x32? A plain guide to choosing binoculars for farmland birds: exit pupil, field of view, close focus, waterproofing, prisms and eyecups.
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Winter bird feeding for a cottage garden on the chalk
What to feed garden birds in winter, how to keep feeders clean, where to hang them away from cats and glass, and which winter visitors to look out for.
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Your first season on a flinty chalk allotment
Taking on an allotment on thin, flinty chalk: clearing it in stages, feeding the soil, growing brassicas well and a month-by-month plan for year one.
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Sloes, blackberries and good manners: hedgerow foraging on the chalk
Picking blackberries, elderberries, sloes, rosehips, hazelnuts and crab apples from the hedges, with the lookalikes to avoid, the law and simple etiquette.
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Reading a flint church: stone, brick and building phases in north Hertfordshire
A field guide to the walls of north Hertfordshire churches: field and knapped flint, clunch, Totternhoe stone, tufa, brick, and how to read building phases.
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The Icknield Way from Lilley to Telegraph Hill, and what to wear on chalk
Walking the Icknield Way from Lilley up to Telegraph Hill and the Pegsdon Hills, with plain advice on boots, gaiters, poles and maps for chalk tracks.
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Farmland birds between Offley and Lilley, season by season
Skylarks, yellowhammers, kites and winter thrushes on the chalk fields between Offley and Lilley: what to look and listen for in each season.
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Lilley Hoo: the open common and its racing past
Lilley Hoo survived the 1768 enclosure as open common, hosted horse races for about a century and gave Telegraph Hill its name. Here is what the sources say.
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Chalk garden plants for thin, dry soil
Thin alkaline chalk soil in north Hertfordshire dries fast and starves greedy plants. These are the plants and habits that cope with it best.
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Why King's Walden sits nearly a mile from its church
King's Walden's church stands by the Bury while the village lies along a road nearly a mile off. The parish records explain how that came about.
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