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The Village - Natural History
A wildlife walk around Chesham Bois
A casual visitor to Chesham Bois would see just another pleasant, leafy, residential area. Look closely at a map and you will see that about half the parish is residential. The other half is divided almost equally between open fields and woodland. If each house occupies about a quarter of its plot, with the rest being gardens, then only 1015% of the parish is actually built on. The River Chess runs the length of the northern boundary. This range of habitats means that Chesham Bois is rich in wildlife. Recent surveys of the plants alone found 132 species on the Common and 71 species in the meadow in front of the church. This meadow has probably never been ploughed.
Chesham Bois is roughly triangular in shape, the long southern boundary running east to west along Chestnut lane, South Road and Copperkins Lane. The land slopes down to the north-east, in places quite steeply, to where it meets the equally long northern boundary, the river. With some exceptions, housing has been restricted to the narrow level land along the river and the flat or gently sloping lane adjoining Amersham at the top of the hill. Fanning out from the higher ground down to the river are six dry valleys, five of which have public footpaths or tracks, two shallow ones on farmland to the west, the others rather deeper with varying kinds of woodland.
Probably the best known and most visited area is the Common. Fifty years ago, this was an area of grassland, gorse, scrub and a few large trees. It is no longer used for grazing, and has, with the exception of the cricket pitch and the area around the pond, developed into an area of mixed woodland. The soil here is clay with flints on top of underlying chalk. Most of the species of tree that grow in the parish can be found on the Common, and it is the only place where the soil is deep enough for oaks to grow to any size or in large numbers. In the valleys, the soil is thinner, and in the steeper ones it is sometimes completely washed away, exposing the chalk beneath. Towards river, the ground begins to level off and here much of the soil washed down from the hill has accumulated, forming a rich layer along main Chess valley where the allotments are to be found.
A little further downstream the valley widens and there are watercress beds and meadows. From the Common, walking at a leisurely pace, it is possible to explore most of the more interesting natural history of the parish in a little over two hours. A good place to start is Bricky Pond on North Road. This is teeming with wildlife. In early spring, look out for frogs, newts, toads and three-spined sticklebacks. Later in the year, dragonfly, damselfly, mayfly and water beetle larvae can be seen in the water, and, water boatmen, whirligig beetles and newts coming to the surface to breathe. Walking on surface are pond skaters and if you are lucky, a strange creature called a water measurer, like a tiny, black stick insect. Coot, moorhen and mallard ducks are nearly always present and from late spring onwards can be seen with their young. At quiet times of day,might see a heron on the edge or even a muntjac, a small d drinking. During warm weather, numerous species of dragonfly, damselfly can be seen hunting for insects over the water or rest on the vegetation. In the water, there are water lilies, and around margins grow yellow iris, various species of rush and reedmace, of] incorrectly called bulrush, as well as different kinds of willow.
In a short walk around the Common you can find most of the wellkown British trees. These include ash, blackthorn, elder, elm, field mar hawthorn, holly, horse chestnut, mountain ash (rowan), oak, silver birch, sweet chestnut, sycamore, yew, and some very large mild cherries. At the Bois Lane end of the Common, there are large clumps of winter heliotrope. Although the Chilterns are famous for bee, only a few small specimens grow on this clay soil.
From the pond, cross North Road and walk towards the main Amersham Road. Before reaching it, take one of the paths off to the right through the woods to cut off the corner. You should come opposite Bois Avenue. The woods are mainly oaks, between 50 and 100 years old. You can tell the age of an oak tree quite accurate by measuring round the trunk at about chest height. One inch (2.5 cm) = 1 year. A 100-year-old oak should be 100 inches (250 cm) in circumference. Here in spring you can see wood anemones bluebells and an unusual plant with pinkish flowers called coralroot bittercress. Later there will be cow parsley, dog's mercury, ground elder, wild arum and geum.
Cross the main road just to the right of Bois Avenue and go down Mayhall Lane. Now only a track, this was once the main road do to Chesham. Along the fences you will see various willowherbs, garlic mustard, golden rod, and hazel. There are also various garden escapes. Burdock and goosegrass grow beside the hedge along the sports field. They both have fruits that spread by hooking on to animals' coats. Large areas of stinging nettles provide food for caterpillars of peacock and tortoiseshell butterflies. Willowherb provides for those of the elephant hawk moth. Look carefully into some of the other wild flowers growing here. You will probably see great variety of insects feeding on them, including many species beetles, hoverflies and bumblebees. Other butterflies are often seen here - in spring, orange tip and brimstone, in late summer comma, red admiral, whites, copper and blues. Just before dusk, you can sometimes see barn owls hunting along the hedgerows near Mayhall Farm.
Pass through the kissing gate, cross the field and into Howlet's Wood. It is very dark here and can feel quite sinister. This part of the wood is mainly conifers and being evergreen, little light penetrates any time of the year, so few plants can survive beneath the tress. Many small birds can be heard, if not seen, especially goldcrests, blue tits, coal tits and long-tailed tits. Further down the path the conifers give way to more common fast-growing trees like ash and sycamore. Beneath these grow bluebells, white and yellow dead nettles, herb robert and woodruff. Hanging from the trees like thick ropes are the stems of old man's beard (wild clematis). All through this wood the chalk shows through the soil, which being very thin makes it impossible for oaks to grow.
Just before the path leaves the wood, take one of the small tracks off to the right and you will soon enter Beech Wood. Here at last is typical Chiltern wood, predominantly beech with an undergrowth of bramble, campion, willowherb, bluebells and woodruff. In a little while you will cross two ridges which mark the route of the old road you left as you crossed the field to Howlet's Wood. You are now in Elvidge Wood. Like most woodland there are always fallen decaying trees, often covered with mosses, ferns and, especially in autumn or after a prolonged wet spell, fungi. It is not unusual to smell, if not see, stink horns. On reaching a larger track, follow it towards the main road. Cross with care! Continue downhill a little way and pass through the large gate on the right into Little Hodds Wood. Follow the track until you reach a large hollow -- Aldridge's Dell. The rim of the dell is circled with old beech trees whose roots have become exposed as the chalk has been eroded by the action of weather and children. Some of these roots are quite spectacular and it is difficult to believe that at some time in the past the soil must have been nearly two metres higher. Continue past the dell into Hodds Wood keeping the fields visible on your left. You will pass the style where Thomas Harding, the Protestant martyr, was arrested in 1532. Soon afterwards you will come to the burial ground, where you should turn right and enter Great Bois Wood.
About 1990 most of the wood on this west facing side of the valley was felled and replanted with oak, ash, silver birch, cherry an rowan. In the years that followed there was an explosion of wild flowers, which in turn attracted an enormous range of invertebrate, most noticeably butterflies, bugs and beetles. This is now changing as bramble and wild rose take over and smother the annual and less vigorous plants. These in turn will disappear as the trees develop an cut out the light, and it will become like the other areas of woodland. Follow the path until it descends to the large rutted track run down the bottom of the valley, on the way looking for the yellow John's wort, knapweed and figwort. This track leads down from Amersham to Bois Moor Road and separates Great Bois Wood from Bois Wood. Here you can either turn right and follow the track back up to the Common or go left and take one of a number of small paths on the right off into the wood.
Much of the woodland here has been neglected and many of the trees are diseased and dying. They attract all kinds of wood-boring creatures, to the delight of insectivorous birds like green and greater spotted woodpeckers and nuthatches, all very vocal at any time the year. In spring, the territorial drumming of the male greater spotted woodpeckers can be heard echoing through the woods later the dull thudding as they attack an old tree stump looking juicy beetle larvae. Green woodpeckers can be heard laughing as they fly from tree to tree. Dead tree stumps are covered with wonderful collections of fungi and mosses. Much of the ground is covered ivy, which does not need much light.
Continue up the hill and you will bear round to the left and eventually come out halfway up Jacob's ladder, the steepest hillside in the parish – 47 m (150 ft) over a distance of 200 m. Erosion is very severe here and it is surprising that such large trees can cling to hillside. Scattered through these woods are numerous elders with edible Jew's ear fungus growing on their stems. The jet-black King Alfred's Cake fungus grows on the dead trunks of ash and beech. Throughout all these woods, there is evidence of the healthy number of badgers, fox, muntjac and many smaller mammals such as shrews mice and voles. At night-time, from summer onwards, young tawny owls can be heard squeaking as they move from tree to tree.
Climb to the top of Jacob's ladder and turn left when you meet the track. Pass to the right of St Leonard's Church and along a drive lined with lime trees with a meadow on the left. At the road, turn right into Bois Lane. Along here can be seen at certain times of the year a strange pinkish-white flower with no green leaves. This is the toothwort, a plant parasitic on the roots of the surrounding tree Continue along Bois Lane until you reach the war memorial, turn right and back to the pond.
You may wonder why this walk has not included the Chess. Unfortunately, access to the river within the parish is rather limited the only walkable section being behind Cressbed Villas between Hollow Way Lane and the mineral water factory. Although only a very short section, there is plenty to see - herons, dabchicks, kingfisher swans, cormorants, great-crested grebes, grey and pied wagtails, well as all the usual woodland and garden birds. Along the banks are iris, great reed mace, water mint and of course watercress, with areas of water crowfoot. Trout can frequently be seen. They eat many of the typical creatures of chalky streams, such as caddis, mayfly stoneflies and their larvae. Much wildlife comes into gardens, which themselves provide a huge range of habitats. Occasionally you can see kestrels, sparrowhawks hobbys and red kites. If you are lucky, during long hot summer days bee or humming bird hawk moths may visit your garden!
Ted Holmquist