Ranscombe Farm reserve...

A short walk on a bright December morning...

Ranscombe reserve showing 19th Century field designations....

A few of the old field names are still in everyday use  (Brockles, for example) but many have vanished from local custom. Those shown above were taken from an 1839 tithe map reproduced in Derek's Church's local history, Cuxton - A Kentish Village, showing the field names in use at the time. Note that Lower Bush was then known as Lower Birch, with the hamlet of Bush/Birch actually being more populous than Cuxton until the 1900s.

These days, the land is managed by Plantlife under the umbrella of the Ranscombe Farm reserve for the preservation of wild plants and flowers rather than by tenant farmers and their families, who must have had to work hard to extract a living from the stony, chalky soil of the valley.

Taking the track through the railway underpass at Whiteleaves leads out onto the main path through the lower valley. The fields of Great North Dean, Little North Dean, Little Bottoms and Nether Great Bottoms are now just generally referred to as Southern Fields.

Southern valley, looking east. 

The fields are still surprisingly green, mostly down to a covering of Annual Mercury and a yellow-flowering brassica that I think is Charlock...

Annual Mercury

Charlock (?)

The abundant yellow flowers provide some welcome winter colour.

From the north of Kitchen Field

Kitchen Field, looking east...

Kitchen Field has been ploughed, presumably to bring up dormant wild flower seeds or to break the surface for whatever seeds the Plantlife guys may throw down.  Either way, the results should be colourful next year.

Twenty Acres field, from Kitchen Field...

Walking back along the bottom edge of Birch Wood, some more winter colour could be found...

Holly...

Clematis...

Tuggs Field had also appeared to have been planted with a cover crop of mustard and forage radish, which was still in full flower and made for an unusual and welcome sight in winter...

Tuggs Field...