During the Christmas holidays the regular dog walkers at Darland Banks and Queendown Warren were joined by those who needed some fresh air and exercise after too much turkey and television.
On Darland Banks many bushes were still loaded with the berries of this year’s warm and productive summer. Hawthorn, ivy, privet, blackthorn, spindle and dog rose berries were particularly noticeable. Rose hip are the favourites of wood (or long tailed field) mice who store them in old birds’ nests. Wood mice are also fond of the kernals of hawthorn berries. They are agile climbers, have prominent black eyes and large ears and are mainly nocturnal. I have them in my own garden where they make a nuisance of themselves by eating most of the peas I set in the Spring.
The jay can be heard in Ambley and Hoath Woods which overlook Darland Banks. It has a pinkish brown plumage with a tail and upper wing feathers of black and white. The bird is rarely found far from trees. Unlike the rest of the crow family it seldom ventures out into fields or other open spaces. When searching for food in trees or on the ground it tends to hop and leap about. Jays are normally heard before they are seen. Their alarm call consists of a series of shrieks which have a harsh and rasping edge. Their favourite food is acorns, which they bury under leaves or roots in small holes. This year acorns have been quite prolific and thousands of them will doubtless be buried. The bird seems to have an excellent memory and so recalls where most acorns were buried. Many young oak trees can be seen on Darland Banks, proving that not all of the jay’s buried acorns are found and retrieved.
Green woodpeckers are also fairly common birds on Darland Banks. They have pre-dominantly green plumage above with a bright crimson crown and striking yellow rump. They can often be disturbed on the ground whilst feeding on ants. The call of the green woodpecker is a loud, ringing laugh or ‘yaffle’. The bird has a deep, undulating-flight.
Blackcaps - members of the warbler family- nest on Darland Banks and one or two sometimes over-winter there instead of migrating. They can occasionally be seen in the bushes adjoining the bottom gardens of Hoath Close. Blackcaps eat mainly insects, although they will take berries and other vegetable food in Autumn and Winter.
The habitat of Queendown Warren is much the same as that of Darland Banks except that the Warren suffers less from the growth of the intrusive hawthorn bush and so has more open downland than the Banks. The latter usually have a bigger crop of Summer and Autumn berries, although this year Queendown Warren sports the biggest display of berries I have ever seen on a single spindle tree.
The Warren lost a lot of its old beech trees in the gale of October 1987 but a handful of magnificent specimens still survive, particularly on the west bank, which adjoins Matts Hill Farm. Some of the massive old trunks are carved with the initials of people who visited the Warren long ago and who no doubt have fond memories of it.
Magpies are usually present at Queendown Warren and can sometimes be seen in large numbers. The magpie has a harsh chattering call in contrast with the jay whose call is harsh and screeching. All members of the crow family have much the same diet - small birds and mammals, eggs, insects, worms and vegetable matter - but it is the magpie which has the reputation of a notorious predator of eggs and young birds in the breeding season.
The chaffinch is this country’s most common finch but is only occasionally seen in the gardens of Rainham. In December, however, a flock of the birds could be found under the beech trees of Queendown Warren where they were feeding on fallen beechmasts. Flocks of bramblings, Winter visitors from Scandinavia, are often found with flocks of chaffinches. Bramblings can be distinguished by their white rumps. Squirrels may also be disturbed feeding on beechmasts. They spend more time in their dreys in Winter but do not truly hibernate. Mixed flocks of tits were also fairly common on Queendown Warren and in the adjoining Potter’s Wood in December. Long tailed tits were perhaps the most distinctive in these flocks. They look like flying teaspoons.