Life of a Chalkstream: Mr. Heron is dead. Long live Mr. Heron

Life on a Chalkstream

24th October 2025

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· Mr. Heron is dead. Long live Mr. Heron

An outbreak of bird flu reaches the Wallop valley

· Arise, Lord Jardine!

· Learning something new about yew

· The power of Gone Fishing

· Wildlife Photographer of the Year

· Quiz

Greetings!

A sad sight the other morning - our resident heron floating dead, partially eaten, on the lake at The Mill.

This is not the first time I have found a dead, adult heron here; a few years back on the Brook I found another that had just been shot. The reason for the death of last week’s heron was harder to discern. We speculated that it may have been attacked by an otter or fox but in a life or death tussle of that nature my money would be firmly on Mr. Heron. They are strong. They are tough. And that is a beak that will pierce deep into any flesh. Maybe, though I could see no injuries to confirm it, that this one had also been shot and wounded, returning home but with injuries that would eventually end its life.

However, all my guesswork was well wide of the mark, for a few days later I heard that in our next-door village of Broughton an outbreak of bird flu had been declared on 11/October the same day we found the corpse. This seems to me the most likely cause of death and that the ever opportunist otters had had a go at the body.

You might think that the death of a heron, a fish eater, might be the cause of celebration but really they are not birds that have much impact on the trout for they are far more focused on easier, smaller prey such as frogs, mice and bullheads. That said, I think Mr. Heron and I had reached a sort of working arrangement. Most mornings I would see him patrolling along the edge of the lake (plenty of our fish have heron-inflicted scars) at which point I would go out onto the balcony and wave my arms which, despite the 50-75 yards distance between us, he would acknowledge by lugubriously taking off to fly a short distance to grumpily take up station in the water meadows.

Of course, I think we both knew we were indulging in a fiction for he would inevitably return later in the day when I was not around. However, judged by the evidence of dead fish, otter kills and heron kills being distinctly different, I would say fur outkills feather 20-1. Anyway, to kill a heron is pointless – there is always a population of the dispossessed looking for a new haunt though for a week or so in our particular instance the egret, who usually had to play second fiddle to Mr. Heron, strutted around with that strange egret head jerk walk, as king of the hill.

But on Monday the natural order of things returned. As I walked around the lake clearing the grilles of the autumn leaves, my daily task between now and Christmas, a grey body curled in the air above my head executing a deft landing on the bank of the lake. Mr. Heron is dead. Long live Mr. Heron

Arise, Lord Jardine!

There are not many headlines that make my heart sing with joy but the one on Monday “Fishing to be taught in schools” certainly did.

For those who missed it, this is a new GCSE, BTEC and A-level qualification that has grown out of The Countryside Alliance Foundation’s Fishing for Schools programme which has been championed by Charles Jardine for nearly twenty years. My gut tells me this might be the fillip angling, and outdoor pastimes in general, needed to arrest the decline in interest of successive generations we have seen over many decades.

Charles Jardine at the House of Commons launch of the new qualifications accompanied by the Lakedown Fishery & Brewery crew

I say this having seen the massive benefit of our local Sparsholt College, a leader in fishery management courses where it is not all about degree level academia. Sparsholt takes young boys and girls at that critical crossroads in their education, where they can swap classroom learning for an institution that values outdoor talent. Fishing Breaks is living proof of this, many who do and have worked with me, proud and talented alumni of Sparsholt. It seems to me that these new qualifications, to be taught in schools from late 2026, which range from Level 1 (Introduction) through to Level 3 (Advanced Skills), the latter earning university entry points, may do for the whole country what Sparsholt has done on a more localised level.

On a side note, four or five years ago, I was asked to sponsor an application for an OBE which I willingly did. For reasons I do not know that OBE was never granted but frankly that person deserves more for his legacy, which will now cascade down through many generations. Arise, Lord Jardine! Can anyone make that happen?

Learning something new about yew

I learnt a new word today – aril. My father had a liking for yew berries but still lived to a ripe old age despite the general assumption that they are deadly poisonous. I was reminded of this as I walked around the perimeter of The Mill this morning which has a yew hedge which this year, in common with most hedgerow plants, is thick with berries.

Unlike my father, I have never quite had the cojones to eat a yew berry, called an aril, the trick being to remove the seed (the poisonous bit), from the red flesh which is indeed edible much liked by birds and, strangely, foxes both of whom have a digestive systems through which the seed passes undigested providing distribution for the species.

However, for nearly all other creatures, including ourselves, yew is deadly poisonous with no antidote which explains why the tree, essential for longbow making, was grown in churchyards - one of the few fenced off areas away from livestock in the times before the first Enclosure Act of 1604.

Of course, like most plants, the yew is not all bad from a human perspective. The drug Docetaxel is derived from yew leaves, a highly effective chemotherapy compound. Slightly more esoterically on hot days, yew can give off hallucinogenic vapours and standing in the fine golden pollen is said to shift consciousness, which may well explain why everyone finds The Mill, with over half a mile of yew hedging, such a calming place!

The power of Gone Fishing

It seems unbelievable for such a cockeyed concept but Gone Fishing, that begins its eighth series on Sunday, has propelled angling back into mainstream consciousness.

Quite why two old gits and a dog has found the sweet spot in the TV viewing habits of BBC watchers I have no idea but I can say for sure, judging by the many people who call up to cast that first line or rekindle a childhood passion, Bob and Paul are mining a productive seam on behalf of all of us in the fishing business.

It is a seam that looks set to continue as angling consultant to the show, John Bailey, tells me they have already begun filming the ninth series, a tenth is under discussion and the Christmas Special is in the can.

John, Paul & Bob

I caught up with John on Tuesday evening, just in from a day trotting with maggots and worms for perch on the River Wye, the banks of which he moved to not so long ago after half a lifetime in East Anglia. John described the day as ‘amazing’ with plenty of good sized perch, chub and barbel. He reckons, subject to rains and frost, we probably have another six weeks to wring out from the neck of the season. So, if you fancy a last gasp day this side of Christmas check out the options with John here ……

Wildlife Photographer of the Year

As ever, the Wildlife Photographer of the Year, currently on show at the Natural History Museum did not fail to impress with both the beauty and pain of nature captured by some remarkable people. Having just been writing about egrets it seemed rather appropriate to share this one with you, definitely one of my top ten from the exhibition.

Egret chasing ladyfish chasing bait fish in China

I am sure that you, like me, have fond memories of childhood visits to the Natural History Museum; it is sort of in our collective DNA so I must admit I felt rather embarrassed as a native for the greeting the Museum gives to its visitors, a majority of which are clearly from overseas. Firstly, the cost of admission to Wildlife is an eye-watering £17.50 a head, plus you get harangued to give an extra donation. I do mean literally harangued as once past the ticket barrier you have to pass along a zigzag path between ten donation touch screens with a man shouting imprecations to pull out a credit card to give one last time. I could barely understand what he was saying and I could see the bafflement of non-English speakers who had no idea whether this emotional obstacle course was compulsory or voluntary. And this from an institution that received over £70m this year from the taxpayer.

The commentary that went along with each photo was for the most part helpful and illuminating; rarely are these photos the result of a random point and press of a smartphone. However, readers did get rather bludgeoned with the theme of ‘we are trashing our planet so wake the f**k up’. Genuinely, I do not think anyone there needed to be told this with every third photo.

And then as you leave the darkened exhibition area you enter a brightly lit 10,000 sq. ft hall full of what is best described as tat. You know what I mean; all those pointless trinkets, baubles, mementos and keepsakes that only seem to have a home in tourist gift shops. I suspect 90% of the product is sourced overseas, 95% manufactured from manmade materials and 100% of it all will be landfill within a decade.

Perhaps the Natural History Museum should take a long look in the mirror to ask whether they are doing to our planet themselves precisely what they abhor in others.