Tuesday, 14th. Though mainly grey and wet, the weather continues to be mild. At Hastings Country Park situated on the coast of the English Channel, small groups of house martins were observed feeding as was the occasional easterly trickle of swallows on migration. Work started here today on removing an area scrub to encourage the return of heathland. In the Ashdown forest area, bell heather, heath milkwort and ragwort are still to found in flower. As our villages Parish Tree Warden, I was requested to inspect a large magnificent beech tree as to its safety; outwardly it appeared well.
Thursday, 16th. Have now got approval to increase the Trust’s number of ponies by 10 to total 80 ponies! Met with representatives of the National Trust and Eastbourne Borough Council this morning to discuss the finer points of this coming winter’s pony grazing at Birling Gap, Belle Tout and Beachy Head. A glorious, mild sunny morning on this spectacular coastline. (Yesterday, a German couple returned from the beach to the car park at the ‘Gap carrying a WW2 live shell, placing it behind their car and then informing the staff there. The authorities when informed, nearly had kittens!).