Crowhurst Nature Reserve is a four and a half acre community-owned woodland in Crowhurst, East Sussex, known locally as Quarry Wood. It was bought by the village for the village in 1999 to protect and preserve it.
Paul Johnson is the warden and has been writing a series of articles called Tales from Quarry Wood for the village magazine since 2008. Our little reserve is the central thread and star turn, but his themes often range further, taking in ecology, botany, mycology, history, mythology, Latin and literature. All with a healthy dose of irreverence and the odd bit of Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.
Click here for more about Paul and Crowhurst Nature Reserve; the most recent article is below and you can explore all the previous articles through the chronological year tabs above or take a more meandering approach using the tags.
Hello everyone. As we enter the month of Fools and fertility, it is time to conclude our monthly trawl through the archives and bring our Mini Environmental Encyclopaedia to an end. So, with this briefest of introductions, here are the letters W to Z.
War:
The act of war is the most destructive activity that our species can direct its energy towards. Our ability to destroy our surroundings whilst killing each other has increased by several orders of magnitude since the Battle of the Crocus Fields in 352 BC. – TQW November 2014
Wasp:
Out of a staggering 9,000 Wasp species in this country, only 250 of the larger species have the ability to sting and just nine of these make up the Vespidae (Social Wasps). The scourge of picnickers and beer-garden diners is almost certainly the Common Wasp (Vespula vulgaris). – TQW May 2016
Wassail:
People surrounded the apple trees, making as much noise as they could to waken the slumbering tree spirits and ensure a good crop. Twelfth Night is still marked by carousing crowds in orchards. – TQW December 2016
Water:
Paul’s very first article for the Crowhurst News was called Where has all the Water gone? It was about the pond levels in Quarry Wood, as variable today as they were then. – TQW September 2008
Paul Johnson Quarry Wood 2008
Last month saw the highest ever recorded water level, beyond the bench. See below for a video of pond view photos over the years. It is not quite Fixed-Point Photography… but nearly! Perhaps even more intriguing than the water levels, though, are the increasingly diagonal trees that, one by one, finally crash into the water…
Water Vole:
11 of the 47 mammals native to Britain are now classified as being at imminent risk of extinction, including the Water Vole (Arvicola amphibius), our iconic Hedgehog (Erinaceus europaeus), and the nocturnal Hazel Dormouse (Muscardinus avellanarius). – TQW September 2020
Weather:
Our conversation often associates major events with the weather on the day, for example: the Queen’s Coronation, poor girl, it poured down! England World Cup final in 1966, phew, lucky the rain kept off. The Spanish Armada, nice refreshing breeze, get the washing on the line! The night shift on the evening of 15th October 1987, well it might get a tad blowy, but I doubt I will need a coat! – TQW December 2015
Woodlouse:
The ubiquitous Woodlouse of the Order Isopoda (from Greek, iso-same and poda-foot) is the most successful terrestrial Crustacean, and boasts more nicknames than the Scarlet Pimpernel. – TQW September 2012
Wordsworth, William:
Suddenly Constable and Turner were painting landscapes, Van Gogh was busy with starry nights and sunflowers and Monet gave us his Water lilies; the natural world was becoming popular! Wordsworth summed up this feeling when he described the Lake District as “a sort of national property in which every man has a right and interest who has an eye to perceive and a heart to enjoy.” – TQW April 2014
Wren:
The Quarry Wood air is full of birdsong, Robins and Wrens flutter through the undergrowth, Blackbirds riffle through the ground cover, Corvids squabble in the canopy and Buzzards call out as they spiral up into the brilliant blue sky. – TQW June 2020
Wyndham, John:
“And we danced, on the brink of an unknown future, to an echo from a vanished past.” – TQW September 2020
Xanthophylls:
Just as chlorophyl absorbs red and blue light and appears green, so does carotene absorb blue-green and blue light and reflects yellow light back for us to enjoy. In similar vein anthocyanins are the basis for the colour red, xanthophylls, yellow-orange and tannin, brown or tan. – TQW December 2010
Xylaria:
The tiny black and white Candlesnuff Fungus (Xylaria hypoxylon) is faintly bioluminescent as the phosphorus in the mycelium reacts with oxygen, but humans are unlikely to see this. – TQW/Biodiversity/Fungi
Xylem:
Water and dissolved nutrients are taken up into the plant via the roots through vascular tissue called xylem (from Greek xylon-wood). The water fills the cells and provides the structure of the plant as it grows. – TQW June 2011
Yaffle:
The largest of our Woodpeckers is the Green Woodpecker (Picus viridus), sometimes called Yaffle for its distinctive loud, hysterical call. [We regularly have Greater Spotteds nesting in Quarry Wood, turn right from the gate, look for the holes and tune in your ears.] – TQW April 2013
Yew:
These familiar denizens of the British churchyards are well known for their longevity and many Yews throughout the country have seen at least a thousand summers. It is no wonder the species became a symbol of immortality, though conversely, perhaps because they were traditionally grown in churchyards, they became associated with death and doom. – TQW November 2022
Yew tree at St George’s Church, Crowhurst,
Zaphod Beeblebrox:
The creator of Zaphod Beeblebrox and Marvin the Paranoid Android was quite correct in that the Earth is predominately blue and green as seen from space; the former being our oceans and the latter representing the most momentous natural factory we will ever have the privilege to see in operation! – TQW July 2009
Zeus:
Selene, the Goddess of the Moon, fell in love with a good-looking youth called Endymion and begged Zeus to put him into an eternal sleep so that he would not age and she could watch him for ever. [Read the article to find out how this relates to Bluebells!] – TQW June 2010
I hope you have enjoyed this A to Z series. I have had a lot of fun delving into TQW articles of yesteryear and choosing which of the ramblings to receive the light of day once more. Next month we focus on the future and look forward to planning our jubilee year.
Enjoy the spring flowers, the birdsong and warmer days, Ma Nature’s gifts freely given and there for us all to take time and appreciate our glorious countryside.
Hello everyone. Spring may have sprung by the time this goes to press, but I am writing this on a gloomy mid-February day, having just emptied the rain gauge for the second time this month.
Fortunately, the rain held off long enough for the Quarry Wood team to have a belated festive get-together. The gang arrived, mince pies were replaced by fruit pies and wine was warmed over a modest camp fire. In addition to the spiced beverage, we also mulled over several suggestions for marking our Jubilee year. Watch this wooded space!
With this in mind, it is time for our penultimate scurry through the archives as we recollect a few of the Ts, Us and Vs from sixteen years of TQW.
Toad:
Springtime finds them trotting back to their ancestral breeding ponds using an enviable heightened navigational and homing sense. As soon as they arrive back at the ponds the messy and extraordinarily hazardous operation of mating takes place. – TQW May 2021
Townhall Clock:
Our very own Town Hall Clock plant (Adoxa moschatellina) is probably the oldest of only a the handful of green flowers found in Britain. – TQW May 2019
Thor:
Quite naturally the Birch was then associated with fertility and new birth and in Norse mythology the tree is dedicated to Thor who just happens to be the God of that heady mix, thunder and fertility! – TQW March 2009
Triffid:
Not the 7ft tall, stinging killers that perambulated on their three legs throughout the pages of John Wyndham’s novel, but a much smaller plant which, fortunately, cannot follow you on a stroll. Commonly mistaken for Gypsywort (Lycopus europaeus) in its early stages, the Trifid Bur-marigold (Bidens tripartita) has a number of subspecies and varieties, and it takes an acute botanical eye to identify them to that level. – TQW September 2020
Trifid Bur-marigold, Combe Valley Country Park
United Kingdom:
We have the good fortune to live in a corner of the world where poaching, illegal logging and eco-crimes are kept down to a rate that is less than excessive. If this does not sound like a ringing endorsement of the way our country looks after the natural world, then you are quite right, it isn’t! Wildlife persecution and habitat destruction occurs in the UK on a major scale, much of it illegally and much more of it sanctioned by the powers that be. – TQW July 2020
Universe:
I often wonder if, like Humans, other species think that the universe revolves around them and, if so, where they place Homo sapiens on the popularity chart! – TQW April 2019
Ursine:
The Latin for Wild Garlic (or Ramsom) is Allium ursinum. For those of you puzzling over the ursine connection, the plant owes its species name to the brown bears habit of digging up the bulbs as a tasty treat. – TQW June 2010
Urticaria:
The medics among you will have already made the connection between the Latin for Nettle, Urtica (from the Latin Uro, to burn) and the medical condition Urticaria known to most of us as Hives. – TQW May 2011
Venerable Bede:
That stalwart Makem, the Venerable Bede, referred to the summer months of June and July as the Early Litha Month and the Later Litha Month in his 8th Century treatise, De temporum ratione. He wrote this learned document in an attempt to explain how the precise date of Oestre (later known as Easter) was calculated. – TQW July 2013
Vikings:
At our 2002 Woodland Festival, we even had our very own Viking colony spring up in our midst. William Del Tufo, craftsman, woodsman and self-confessed decendent of the axe-wielding skull-splitters, brought along some like-minded folk and constructed a Nordic hut complete with woven fence and fire pit. It was so well-made and cosy that the one-eyed All-Father himself would have been happy to leave the Halls of Valhalla to reside there, well maybe a short holiday! – TQW/Events
Violet Webcap:
A vivid dark purple fungi, this relatively rare species has been recorded and photographed twice in Quarry Wood. It is much larger than its paler cousin, the Amethyst Deceiver, which is prolific in our little reserve. – TQW/Biodiversity
Violets:
I know a bank where the wild thyme blows, Where oxlips and the nodding violet grows, Quite over-canopied withluscious woodbine, With sweet musk-roses andwith eglantine. A Midsummer Night’s Dream, William Shakespeare – TQW July 2009
It is with great sadness that I finish this month’s article with a feeling of personal loss that will be echoed by so many people throughout the village, and beyond. Just eleven months after losing her husband, John, Katie Spall succumbed to illness and passed away on February 12th. I have written on many occasions about the close collaboration between Quarry Wood and the Crowhurst Community Arts Fund (Arty Farties) and that they were involved right from the start, twenty-five years ago.
As we know, John was the driving force of the Arties and his inspiration, enthusiasm and network of contacts provided us with numerous, hugely enjoyable and instructive, community-based events over the years. Katie was the practical live-wire who looked after everyone, especially on the catering front. I suspect that the number of dinners, snack boxes, breakfasts and nibbles that Katie helped prepare over the last quarter of a century could have fed the whole of Crowhurst several times over. Amongst her many roles in the village, Katie also sang in the choir, played on the stage, strummed away in the ukulele band and politely listened to me waxing lyrical on various nature walks.
I know there will be many tributes to Katie from young and old alike. She was kind, generous and vivacious. The light has dimmed at the heart of our community.
Adieu dear Katie, it was a pleasure and a privilege.
Hello everyone and a belated Happy New Year! I hope you all had an uplifting Festive Season and, despite the recent ravages of wind and rain, are looking forward to 2024.
As our waking days start to stretch out with infinitesimal increases in daylight, we soldier on through these Winter months of the new year, while keeping an eager eye out for any early signs of spring. Already we are waking up to those first few experimental songs of Blackbirds, and courting frogs are creating a less melodious, but just as welcome, chorus in our ponds. Catkins adorn the Hazel and Willow trees, and the Primroses are popping up in woodland and on our banks and verges.
We are starting our TQW year by continuing our trawl through the archives. As we reach the last nine letters of our mini Environmental Encyclopaedia, here, hopefully for your delectation, are the Rs and the Ss!
Rabbit:
Rabbit owners will be familiar with the fact that Flopsy produces both a soft and a hard pellet, the former is eaten and mixed with food in the stomach so that the nutrients are absorbed the second time around. – TQW March 2014
Red List:
An assessment of the status of all Britain’s 245 bird species with Green, Amber or Red lists according to the level of conservation concern. As always it is a shock to see which of our birds, thus far taken for granted by many, are now at the highest level of extinction risk. – TQW April 2022
Red Squirrel:
With a UK population of a mere 140,000, our native Red Squirrel (Sciurus vulgaris) is in real danger of coming to the end of 10,000 years of inhabiting these islands. Not only is the Grey bigger and more robust, it has the added advantage of being able to digest seeds with a high tannin content more efficiently. This means they can gnaw away on acorns to their heart’s content, as we have seen in QW, and are better suited to populating deciduous woodland than the Red who, despite eating a variety of shoots, seeds, berries and fungi, rely heavily on Pine Nuts in their diet. – TQW Feb 2018
Reindeer:
Only the female Reindeer keep their antlers throughout winter and therefore Rudolph is more likely to have been called Rachel! – TQW December 2014
Robin:
Walk through our little reserve and you will hear the familiar high pitched, almost wistful song before you see the bird (if you are lucky) perched high in the trees or in thick undergrowth. – TQW December 2011
Romans:
Who better to straddle the millennia of the Anthropocene, and give us back a sense of worth than our old friends, the Romans. Not for the first time, the language of the Sandal’d and Toga’d Ones will be central to this month’s ramblings. – TQW June 2019
Rossetti, Christina:
But give me holly, bold and jolly, Honest, prickly, shining holly; Pluck me holly leaf and berry For the day when I make merry. – TQW December 2015
Royal Society for the Protection of Birds:
The RSPB states Mallards and their nests are protected by the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981, which makes it an offence to intentionally kill, injure or take any wild bird, or to take, damage or destroy its nest, eggs or young. Therefore, it is important not to chase a duck that has started nesting, since she must be allowed access to her nest. If you find a nest full of eggs, you must not interfere with them. – TQW June 2014
Saunders, John:
John touched the lives of many people in and around Crowhurst and played a notable role in the history of our little reserve. Who can forget the irascible pair of talking trees who entertained us at our very first event in 2002? Even now, when walking through the Chestnut trees, I half expect John and Pete Linfield to emerge from the undergrowth in their Ent-like foliage, grumbling about people disturbing their rest before heading down the hill for a pint! – TQW December 2021
Shakespeare, William:
Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day? Thou art more lovely and more temperate: Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May, And summer’s lease hath all too short a date: Sonnet XVIII William Shakespeare 1609 – TQW June 2014
Slow Worm:
A subtle mixture of brown and gold, these lovely animals appear almost metallic in the sunlight, especially when young. Adult males lack the dark stripe of the females but often have a series of iridescent blue dots along their side. – TQW June 2021
Slugs:
These ubiquitous Gastropods belong to the venerable Phylum, Mollusca, and carry a vestigial shell as a mark of respect to their evolutionary Snail ancestor. While they are very useful in the compost bin there is no getting away from the fact that they cause a huge amount of damage to crops and garden plants alike. Their tongue-like organ, called a radula, with its 27,000 tooth-like protrusions, acts like a rasp and enables an individual Slug to eat something in the region of forty times its own weight in a single day. – TQW November 2021
Spall, John:
I was a relative newcomer to the village when the photo on the right was taken, a young looking, bearded chap, seemingly a tad bemused while helping to assemble the first pond bench in Quarry Wood. The 2002 Woodland Festival was the beginning of a very successful collaboration between the Arty Farties and Quarry Wood. Farewell John, it was a real pleasure to walk the same trails with you. – CN April 2023
Spalting:
Given favourable temperatures and water content, both hard and soft woods can be spalted. However, the tell-tale mottled bleaching caused by the concentration of white hyphae of numerous fungi is more often found in hardwoods such as Oak, Ash and Beech. – TQW March 2020
Swift:
As they hurtle through the air, beaks open to catch flies and airborne spiders, Swifts emit a high-pitched call which people in the past thought were the screaming souls of the departed being taken to Hell. – TQW May 2022
Next month will be T, U, V, and April will gallop through the rest of the alphabet, drawing the TQW Encyclopaedia to a close. Later on in the year I will look at the ways we are hoping to encourage the next generation to take on the mantle of environmental stewards as we celebrate 25 years of Quarry Wood. In the meantime, have a safe winter and let’s look forward to a wonderful year in the British countryside.
The rock-like mud unfroze a little, and rills Ran and sparkled down each side of the road Under the catkins wagging in the hedge. The Manor Farm, Edward Thomas (1914)
Hello everyone. Having flitted through the history of our corner of East Sussex and looked at the considerable role that four and a half acres of woodland has played in our community, it is now time to concentrate on the Flora and Fauna of our little nature reserve.
Over the past fifteen years, I have written many, many columns worth of print about Ma Nature’s denizens and their habitat, so I feel this article (the third and final Q in our A to Z) should give the spotlight to the plants and animals in all their glory. So, with the minimum of rambling from me, here is a small selection from the Quarry Wood photo album.
Quarry Wood Biodiversity
Trees: Since the railway was removed in 1965, the land has been a textbook example of new woodland colonization: scrubby undergrowth protecting the growth and development of rapidly-growing trees like Silver Birch, Ash, Sweet Chestnut, Salix Sp, Hazel, Holly and Field Maple. A few Oaks have established themselves and it is hoped they will be there for the long term as the wood matures.
Ferns: As mentioned last month, our stunning fernery was one of the first features to be unveiled as the undergrowth was cut back. These gloriously fronded plants give the reserve a flavour of pre-history long before our particular two-legged species was anything more than a glimmer in Ma Nature’s eye.
Wild Flowers: I suspect everyone who lives in the countryside has to some extent an inbuilt calendar based on the succession of wild flowers that sweep across our land throughout the year. Wood Anemones, Bluebells, Wild Garlic, Early Purple Orchids, and many more, carpet the woodlands each representing their place in time and space.
Fungi: A damp, mild autumn, such as we had this year, produces the ideal woodland environment for glorious displays of fungi. In addition to dead wood lying around QW, our bit of natural art, the Fungi Dome, has been a resounding success in promoting different species of fungi in one small clearing.
Insects: Woodlands are fabulous places for insect lovers at the best of times; the addition of a pond completes the picture. It may mean covering up at times, but the sight of a swarm of mini-biters dancing in the sun over the water is magical.
Moths: The Lepidoptera have a special place in the heart of our reserve. Not only are we treated to seeing a variety of butterflies such as Speckled Wood, Comma and the elusive White Admiral fluttering around the brambles and wild flowers, but, thanks to Ralph and his brilliant light trap, we have recorded 174 species of Moth in the past eight years.
Birds: QW has a wonderful range of woodland birds including Robin, Tree Creeper, Wren, Blackbird, Great Spotted Woodpecker, Long Tailed Tits and many more. We also get visitors from the local wetlands including Mallard and Moorhen, which have nested in the past, and a surly looking Heron who investigates the pond from time to time.
Animals: There are plenty of signs that larger animals, such as Badger, Fox and Roe Deer live in or visit the woods on a regular basis. Though we have seen them, taking a decent photograph has rarely been possible. The same goes for Field Mice, Common Shrews, Bats and beautiful Grass Snakes. However, the odd Frog and rather somnolent Newts did pose for a snap or two!
So that just about wraps it up for 2023 and our run up to celebrating a quarter of a century of Quarry Wood life. Have a wonderful Festive Season and we will meet up again next February when we will set out our plans for the year of our Silver Jubilee.
The fervour of the sunbeams descending in tidal flood rings on the strung harp of earth. It is this exquisite undertone, heard and yet unheard, which brings the mind into sweet accordance with the wonderful instrument of nature. From The Pageant of Summer in The Life of Fields, Richard Jeffries (1884)
Let us treasure our little reserve, nature will always find a way to bring some happiness in to our lives.
Hello everyone. Well, after flitting though the centuries last month, we left the little patch of woodland at the top of Sandrock Hill in a state of neglect. People tipped their rubbish and garden waste into the entrance, and over the years, a rusting collection of broken kitchen white-goods, along with old tyres and other waste, formed ominous-looking conformations rising out of the soil and leaf litter. The pond became a murky pool as the canopy closed in over it, and local children braved the tangle of brambles to play in the cave and launch themselves off the rock face on a death-defying rope swing.
As the Millennium approached, the village, in true Crowhurst fashion, formed a committee to help generate ideas and raise funds in order to celebrate the world entering the 21st century. Around the same time the owners of the quarry woodland made it known that the land was going to be up for sale and were hoping to have the process underway by the end of June 1998. The acquisition of a lovely little bit of woodland for the village was clearly seen to be beneficial in so many ways, not least to stop any developers getting their hands on it. But how to raise the money in so short a time? Enter the Crowhurst Society under the leadership of the indefatigable Eddie McCall.
Quarry Wood since 1999
The Crowhurst Society (CS) was formed some 11 years previously to oppose, on behalf of the village, a massive development on the outskirts of Crowhurst. In the last few of years of the 1990s, it set about raising funds to buy Quarry Wood to mark the new Millennium. Thanks to the generosity of villagers who made pledges and bought bonds, the loan for the purchase of the land was covered.
Thus, in 1999, the Crowhurst Society completed the acquisition of four and a half acres of slightly scrappy woodland to protect it in perpetuity. The following summer, the Millennium party weekend included a huge parade that snaked up Sandrock Hill with flags, marshals and celebratory drumbeats, weaving into Quarry Wood for a grand opening ceremony.
The next challenge was to transform the land into a natural, safe haven for people to experience some tranquil time amongst some stunning fauna and flora. Grants were applied for, and the village resounded to the strains of operatic and jazz music as various events took place in order to fill the Quarry Wood coffers and pay for professional fees and insurance.
The CS brought in the expertise of the nearby Powdermill Trust for Nature Conservation to advise and help manage the land as both a community woodland and nature reserve. The Powdermill Trust was set up by John Hicks, a very knowledgeable naturalist and conservationist who ran the organisation from his home. A number of their volunteers teamed up with some hardy villagers… and the work began!
Original site map by John Hicks – May 2000
It was at this point that I began my long association with Quarry Wood and the Crowhurst Society. As a member of the Powdermill Trust, I had helped out on other local reserves and was delighted when they were brought in to manage this piece of land in the village that I had just recently moved to.
So, under the watchful eyes of John Hicks, conservationist extraordinaire, and Eddie McCall, the first Warden of QW, the woodland was transformed. The rubbish was collected and carted away; a new fence and gatepost were installed; footpaths were cut back and the Willow Trees growing in the pond were hoicked out to open up the canopy.
As he had from the very beginning, Eddie kept everyone up to date with extensive progress reports in the Crowhurst News. Various experts from the Powdermill Trust carried out botanical, bird and insect surveys and key features were recorded.
One of the first noteworthy areas in the wood to come to light once the trees were thinned out was the fernery on the rock face by the pond. The presence of some very fine specimens of fern was later verified by the Pteridological Society whom John invited to tour the Reserve in June 2008.
In 2001 it was my pleasure, and honour, to take over as warden of QW. I took it on as an ardent conservationist, thinking the role was primarily to monitor, record and generally care for everything that Ma Nature has to offer. However, in that same year a new village organisation appeared that would go on to influence both my way of thinking, and how the Reserve would be managed to this day.
Out of the ashes of the (by then) obsolete Millennium Committee rose the Phoenix that is the Crowhurst Community Arts Fund, lovingly known as the Arty Farties (AF). With John Spall, yet another of Crowhurst’s great and bearded, at the helm, the AF started to organise one of its first major events that would emphasise the spirit of community in a community woodland.
Click here for John Spall’s write up; click here for Paul’s.
The Arty Farties’ 2002 four day Woodland Festival in Quarry Wood included music, poetry, woodland crafts, guided walks, dancers, Vikings and two green leafy clad Old Men of the Woods with a tale to tell. Over seven hundred people took part across the four days, a phenomenal success. A Family Fun Day in 2013 reprised the magic for a fresh round of children.
Our third major collaboration was in 2017 to mark the Arties’ 100th event. Around 150 people enjoyed art, nature, crafts, music, picnics and fungi spotting in the woods. For me, this encapsulated everything about John Spall’s vision of a community-based arts group.
On the conservation front, after the initial work in the early 2000s, we have kept a light touch on the tiller in terms of maintenance, clearing only what is necessary for ecological value or reasons of safety. Over the years, I have been able to call upon a quite exceptional little band of volunteers for work parties, ensuring that footpaths are fit for purpose, rubbish and litter collected and any hazards dealt with.
Work parties are roughly monthly or in response to need. Please get in touch if you would like to be involved.
In 2015, we had our first Moth Weekend thanks to our great friend Ralph Hobbs of the Powdermill Trust, now an honorary Crowhurst ‘Quarry Wooder’. We have had ten events since then, recording 174 different species. Many people have come along to enjoy the thrill of opening the trap on a Sunday morning, seeing a gorgeous array of stunning Lepidoptera. All survey results go to the Sussex Moth Recorder and the reserve has built up a goodly amount of accreditation for biodiversity.
In 2008, I approached Lorna Neville, then on the Crowhurst News crew, with the idea of a monthly scribble based on the reserve and ranging across other environmental issues. Tales from Quarry Wood passed muster with the CN worthies and Lorna took on the task of doing the layout of the articles and lots of local nature photography. In 2015, TQW went online and we shared articles, species lists and a stunning biodiversity gallery with a much wider audience.
It would be impossible to list everyone who has made Quarry Wood the place it is and what it stands for. But I would like to mention some of the friends we have lost along the way and be grateful for our joyous memories of the time and energy they gave so freely over the past twenty-four years.
We have lost John Hicks, our guiding hand on all things ecological; Pete Linfield, one of the irascible old trees of 2002; John Saunders, village stalwart, publican and the other grumpy tree. And earlier this year, John Spall, who taught me what it means to live in a village community. It was my great pleasure to work alongside all of them.
I must also thank the various village organisations who have supported the Quarry Wood team from the start: the Crowhurst Society, quietly working in the background, the Parish Council, the Fayre Committee, the lovely Brownies who have come along to all the events bringing so much energy and enthusiasm to the woodland, and, of course, the amazing Arty Farties.
Through necessity, this has been the briefest of summaries of the history of Quarry Wood. Click the links for more detailed accounts of events and lots more photos. Next month will be the third Q instalment of our A to Z, focusing on the beautiful nature and biodiversity of our little reserve. As mentioned, next year will be our Silver Jubilee and we hope to celebrate this landmark with wonderful memories and a vision for the future.
Hello everyone. As I sit here sweltering over a hot laptop, we are enjoying the summer’s Swan Song in a blaze of glorious sunshine. However, there is no stopping the Earth’s journey around good old Sol and there are definite signs that Autumn cometh.
Amidst such important seasonal events as Mabon, Haloween and the bottling of Sloe Gin, we at TQW have arrived at our own significant landmark, the letter Q in our alphabetical trawl through the archives that has become this year’s mini Environmental Encyclopaedia, revisiting topics touched on over the years of writing for the Crowhurst News.
As we are career headlong towards 2024 (our silver jubilee year) there can be only one Q for this month’s entry and it is the name of our delightful little reserve…
Quarry Wood before 1999
Clearly, the fact that we are celebrating a meretwenty-five years of Quarry Wood as a nature reserve and community woodland, means that there was an awfully long time before we took it over and created the aforementioned in 1999. Therefore, I plan to make this an article of two halves: this month condensing several hundred years of the general history of the area and the next article will concentrate on our sterling efforts since acquiring the land.
Unusually for me, I won’t dally for long in the times when the Sandal’d and Toga’d Ones yomped across the countryside, mining for ore and keeping the local tribes in order. Suffice to say that they were replaced by the Saxons in the fifth century, and it was these Germanic invaders who gave us our village name, Croghyrste from crōh (meaning nook corner) and hyrst (wooded hill).
After 500 years or so of Saxon rule, a certain rather bloody local battle was fought in 1066. This was followed by just as bloody a quelling of the natives and the area of Sussex became the first in the country to yield under the iron fist of the Normans, the last successful military invaders of these islands.
The result being that Croghyrste, like many towns and villages in the country, came into the possession of a string of wealthy landowners with decidedly French-sounding names.
We can only speculate what the land looked like following these violent, momentous times. It is tempting to imagine Crowhurst, despite its early history of iron working and being on the periphery of the eighteenth-century gunpowder industry, as a peaceful, bucolic village nestled among the woods and fields of an agrarian economy. Indeed, the earliest map that the TQW research department (Lorna and myself) unearthed, suggests that in 1778 such an expectation is perfectly reasonable.
Yeakell and Gardner’s Sussex 1778-1783 (click for larger map)
It was this map, along with another drawn a century later, that exhibited a feature important in the shaping of what we now call Quarry Wood. A curved lane gently sloping up to the junction of Swainham Lane, just right for carts or farmers driving livestock to traverse.
This all changed in the latter part of the nineteenth century when the 8th Earl De La Warr, one of the aforementioned wealthy landowners, decided to develop Bexhill, then little more than a fishing village, into a major health resort, no doubt with a view to rival the then thriving towns of Hastings and Eastbourne.
To help bring this about, the consensus was that a more direct railway route to London was needed. After all, no respectable Victorian should be inconvenienced by having to break their journey and change trains. Thus was a railway line running directly from Bexhill to Battle proposed in 1884, and again in 1885, and yet again in 1889, all to no avail.
It took a consortium of local landowners, including Earl De La Warr, to promote the Crowhurst, Sidley and Bexhill Railway in 1896 and to part-fund the building of a new line to run from the small village of Crowhurst, through Sidley and terminate in Bexhill. After much borrowing and fund raising, Royal Assent for the building of the line was given in 1897 and construction commenced the following year.
The most time consuming and expensive part of the project was of course crossing our lovely marshes, and with great difficulty and a number of near disasters, a seventeen arched viaduct was constructed to carry the line. Such a major project required a huge amount of labour and, as astonishing as it is for us to comprehend now, this resulted in 700 navvies being housed in wooded shacks in Crowhurst.
[Edit to add extra info from a local reader: Apparently Crowhurst School roll swelled during these years with the children of the navvies. Unfortunately the log books showing this were lost in a fire in Lewes in the 1990s.]
A great deal of cutting and excavating had to be done at both Crowhurst and Sidley. The gently curved and sloping lane leading out of the village was straightened, made steeper and given a sharp turn at the top to go over a bridge that the railway went under. This carving out of the rock gave us our ‘quarry’ which we incorporated into the local name over a century after the work was carried out. The stone was fairly low-grade sandstone and used as aggregate, possibly to build the road leading up to the newly built railway station.
The Crowhurst News (2008-09) History Page Compilationcontains some detailed information on the building of the station, the viaduct and the road I now live on! The articles include some fascinating first-hand accounts from people who remembered the railway in all its glory. One of the many interesting facts is that Station Road, as we now know it, was surfaced originally with a red terra-cotta-like material using clay taken from the cutting at Sandrock Hill. Fortunately for us, enough clay was left to ensure our Reserve has a lovely pond, for most of the time at least!
Amidst a great deal of pomp and ceremony at each of the stations, the railway was opened in 1902. The new line cut nine miles off the Bexhill to London journey and a generous service was provided on week days with thirteen trains daily up and then down.
Despite the optimistic start, the line had limited success, many people preferring to use the main line to Victoria. However, the line survived two world wars, the electrification of the main lines and the Nationalisation of the Railways, after which it was very much considered a branch line. It had one more moment of glory when the tunnel at West St Leonards was closed for repair for six months in 1949-50 and it was used as a main line, but its future was bleak.
The end came with the Beeching Report in 1963 and, despite opposition from a number of season ticket holders, the final journey was made on 13th June 1964. Two passengers on that train had been on the very first journey across the viaduct, sixty-two years previously, it must have been an especially poignant experience,
The track was taken up in 1965 and the Seventeen Arches (one of the wonders of Victorian architecture and inspiration for a certain locally written Sherlock Holmes story) were demolished in 1969. This explosive occasion was captured on film by Pathe News, and well worth a look on Youtube for a literal blast from the past!
So where did all of this leave the four and a half acres we now treasure as our very own nature reserve? With its chiselled rockface and straight pathway, an imprint of a former railway age?
Well, for the best part of thirty years (1960s-1990s), it was an informal play area but also, unfortunately, a place for significant rubbish dumping. Naturewise, it was colonised by fast growing trees and shrubs; it became a new woodland in which Sweet Chestnut, Silver Birch, Hazel, Willow and Holly dominated. The canopy gradually closed over the pond, which took on the appearance of a mirky lake in which a Tolkienesque guardian might well have dwelt in the stygian gloom.
Something has crept or been driven out of the dark water under the mountains. There are older and fouler things than orcs in the deep places of the world. The Lord of the Rings, JRR Tolkien
By the late 1990s, with a new century on the horizon and all sorts of village optimism, there were great plans afoot and an exciting new chapter in the story of Quarry Wood. And that, as they say, is a tale for another day! (Let’s say next month.)
Paul Johnson pgcrow@yahoo.com
CROWHURST TO SIDLEY TO BEXHILL WEST RAILWAY GALLERY
Quarry Wood’s Paul Johnson and Fr Michael Brydon (formerly of this parish) are both massive Sherlock Holmes fans, but rather felt it remiss that Conan Doyle had failed to send Holmes and Watson to Crowhurst in any stories. They decided they should rectify this…
Set in Crowhurst in 1909. Holmes and Watson are summoned by village rector and famed letter-writer, the Rev’d James Bacon-Phillips, to assist Lieutenant Colonel Papillon of Crowhurst Park, who has been receiving ominous butterfly wings in the post.
Set in Crowhurst in 1913. Military hero turned original Scoutmaster, Lieutenant General Baden-Powell, lives in nearby Ewhurst Green. Having persuaded a Crowhurst military colleague to host a Scout Camp at Crowhurst Park, he then faces a delicate problem that requires the insight of Holmes and Watson.
Set in Crowhurst in 1922. A railway loving boy from a school in nearby Hawkhurst is staying at the Rectory; Holmes is called upon to investigate his disappearance. A boy who hears poetry in the trains, who imagines voices in the whistles, and who grows up to become the Thomas the Tank Engine author.
Quarry Wood’s Warden, Paul Johnson, gave a talk at the AGM of Crowhurst & District Horticultural Society on 7th October 2016. Click here for the slides outlining the history of our little Reserve and showcasing some of the beauty…
An environmental, educational, slow-mo self-destruct deadwood artwork, inspired by David Nash.
Quarry Wood’s Warden, Paul Johnson, gave a talk at the AGM of Crowhurst & District Horticultural Society on 7th October 2016. Click 
tales from quarry wood 