UPCOMING EVENTS

Now that lockdown measures have eased, we will be having a mixture of indoor and online Zoom meetings. Please check our newsletters or this website for details.

Meetings: are held in EITHER East Horsley Village Hall OR West Horsley Village Hall on the 4th Thursday of the month and are free to members
and £3 for non-members (except for events such as the Christmas Mulled Wine evening, when alternative price details will be advertised).

More information and details of how to get to the Halls are in the “About” section (above) on this website, as well as membership details.

Zoom Meetings: non-members are very welcome to our Zoom meetings for a £3 fee – please email callyharris35@gmail.com for details.

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25 April 2024 (Zoom meeting  7.30pm)

Shores of Devon – illustrated talk by Belle Heaton of the Marine Biological Association

Belle Heaton is a recent Plymouth graduate (Applied Marine Science MRes) who works at the Marine Biological Association as part of the coastal ecology team. She is also a steering group member of the Shores of South Devon (SOSD), a marine life interest association. The first half of this talk will feature a summary of photos from SOSD’s very talented members, highlighting the wonderful and diverse marine life of the South Devon coast. To finish off, we will look through some photos of marine life on some shores near us. This talk will hopefully leave you with the urge to go out and explore your local shoreline and all the cool creatures that call it home.

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23 May 2024 (West Horsley Village Hall (tbc)  7.30pm)

Spiders – illustrated talk by Mike Waite, Surrey Wildlife Trust

Mike is a professional ecologist of some forty years’ experience. He is a very keen naturalist with specialisms in birds, higher plants and, latterly, spiders. His talk will give an overview of spiders, the delights of arachnology, why Surrey is arguably the best county for pursuing it, and a gallery of what is out there. He will also touch on their relevance to the current state of nature in the UK, as well as what may be seen on sites closest to home. In 2020 he re-discovered the very rare Great Fox-spider on Hankley Common.

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26 September 2024 (West Horsley Village Hall (tbc)  7.30pm)

Restoration of Habitat A3/M25 – illustrated talk by Victoria Gilbey, Balfour Beatty Atkins

(Details to follow)

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24 October 2024 (Zoom meeting  7.30pm)

Hornets – Gentle Giants – illustrated talk by Stephen Powles

(Details to follow)

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28 November 2024 (West Horsley Village Hall (tbc)  7.30pm)

AGM followed by:

Camouflage (provisional) – illustrated talk by Adrian Davies

(Details to follow)

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12 December 2024 (West Horsley Village Hall (tbc)  7.30pm)

Geology of the Mole Valley & the Weald – illustrated talk by Andy Los

(Details to follow)

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OUTINGS

The Society occasionally organise outdoor walks and other events. Please check this website for details.

18 April 2024 (Walk – 11am start)

Walk at Stokes Field Nature Reserve, Long Ditton – led by Cally Harris

A gentle stroll around this wooded nature reserve (with a couple of ponds), next to Long Ditton cemetery, which has a host of woodland birds including Blackcap, Chiffchaff, Nuthatch and Great Spotted Woodpecker; then we climb up One-Tree Hill (the tree is long gone) where we find an abandoned rose nursery and, while some of them look much as they did, some have gone rampant. There is a Squires around the corner, where some might choose to repair for coffee or lunch.
(Further information will be circulated nearer the time.)

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17 May 2024 (Walk – 6.30pm start)

Walk around Milton Court Farm – led by Hugh Broom

Hugh gave us a fascinating talk after our AGM on 23^rd November last year about his farm near Dorking, and we are so pleased that he can spare the time to show us around his land at Westcott Road, Dorking RH4 3LY (https://what3words.com/wipes.paths.silver).
Donations to the Farming Community Network (for farmers and their families going through difficult times) would be much appreciated.

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13 June 2024 (Walk – 10am start)

Fairmile Common Walk – led by Dave Page

A guided walk on Fairmile Common, between Esher and Cobham on A307 (The Old Portsmouth Road), led by Dave Page, Commons Steward for Elmbridge Borough Council. Dave has led this walk a couple of times for us, and there is always a bountiful mix of heathland flowers, insects (including Silver-Studded Blue Butterflies, Green Tiger Beetles and, if we’re lucky, the odd scared adder! Dave’s enthusiasm and love of Fairmile is catching – a super walk!
(Further information will be circulated nearer the time.)

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27 June 2024 (Walk – 9pm start)

Nightjar Walk – led by Mike White

A guided walk on Blackheath, near Chilworth Station, led by Mike White, to watch and hear the Nightjars. Nightjars are summer visitors from Africa, and they start calling (or “churring”) and flying at about 9.30 in the evening. If we’re lucky, we will see them showing off to the females by clapping their wings over their backs.
(Further information will be circulated nearer the time.)

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11 July 2024 (Walk – 9.30am for 9.45am start)

Walk across Ripley Green & along the Wey Navigation – led by Peter Croucher

A circular walk, covering a wealth of different habitats – meadow, woodland, Ockham Mill, Wisley golf course, the Wey Navigation and its fascinating “Fish Ladder”.
(Further information will be circulated nearer the time.)

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PREVIOUS MEETINGS

28 March 2024

Badgers – an illustrated talk by Bob Shatwell of West Surrey Badger Group

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22 February 2024

Nature Through the Seasons, Part 2 Autumn/Winter – an illustrated talk by Roger Hance

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25 January 2024

Wasps and Bees – an illustrated talk by Andy Sands

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OUTING REVIEW

Unstead Nature Reserve Walk (20 August)

Ten of us gathered for a really interesting guided tour of Unstead Wetland Nature Reserve on Sunday 20th August. They have a keen group of volunteers, converting this Thames Water waste treatment area into a bird/people friendly haven. One of their many challenges is that the ground is so nutrient rich, that it is a struggle to reduce the vegetation, and this is particularly important to attract waders and other scrub-favouring birds. They have planted trees, created hides, nest boxes and paths and plan to create gravel scrapes to attract snipe and plovers, etc. Apart from the water birds on the main lagoon, the dragonflies, butterflies and other insects were good to watch; and we were fascinated to see that a nestbox built on a pole for the Barn Owls had been taken over by a nest of very active hornets, which had almost totally sealed off the entrance with what looked like a polished sheet of wood, but which had been painstakingly created by the hornets.

The site attracts many warblers, including Cetti’s and Willow, and we saw Buzzard, Kestrel and wagtails. It will be interesting to watch how they develop the site as, for them, funding is naturally very important. We were amused and slightly awed by their low-cost method of controlling the flow of water into the lagoon from the Thames Water plant by using plastic drink bottles to bung/unbung the flow holes!

Cally Harris