TALES FROM THE HILLS

(Ashmansworth and Crux Easton)

In May I was writing a letter in the garden when a hare loped very quietly past the table. Such a sight was a pleasant reward for just sitting still, and well worth the price of the stamp.

When I mentioned it to a friend, she lent me a book called ‘Raising Hare’ by Chloe Dalton. The author had found an abandoned leveret and taken it home. It thrived and grew up, but then it wouldn’t leave. It preferred sitting with Chloe on her sofa, eating porridge and watching TV.

Here in the garden, there was no porridge, no TV and no Chloe to tempt it to stay, so it departed, and disappeared through the hedge.

It was surprising to see how large the hare was, close up. Usually they’re a hundred yards away, retreating up the lane. This one wasn’t troubled at all. Chloe noticed that her hare only became alarmed when she made changes to its environment. She decided that hares see any change as a danger.

They’re right. It usually is.

If the children want to see wildlife in the garden, avoid close-boarded fencing, says David Attenborough. A planner from Basingstoke said much the same thing. He had come to talk to us about a proposed Conservation Area. His main concern was the look of the place. He said they’d chosen Ashmansworth because it is such an attractive example of an English country village. And it has survived. He asked us specifically not to put up close-boarded fences because they will change the character of the village. They are the very essence of suburbia. The same, he said, goes for kerbstones. The English countryside means soft verges.

The irony is that most kerbstones in our two parishes have been put here by the County and Borough Councils, not by us. In fact, it has been the villagers themselves, over the years, who have kept Ashmansworth looking like an English country village, simply because that’s what the place is. It just grew like that.

“All the world’s a stage, and all the men and women merely players.” It is our privilege, living here, that we have the North Wessex Downs National Landscape as our stage. But our role on it, as players, has yet to be written. Perhaps it’s no more than this. Just don’t mess the place up.

Agricola, February 2026