Return to the narrow gaze of a pioneering naturalist

Farmers and volunteers are honouring the legacy of Gilbert White, an 18thcentury parson who inspired Darwin

- Phoebe Weston

The Rev Gilbert White became the first person to identify the chiffchaff, willow warbler and wood warbler as three distinct species. The Hampshire parson was also the first, more than 230 years ago to describe the harvest mouse, the noctule bat, and swifts mating in flight, something not recorded again until the 1930s. He was fascinated by his pet tortoise, Timothy, and why he needed so much sleep.

White's careful, vivid and seemingly trivial descriptions of the wildlife he encountered around the village of Selborne as he walked between parishes made him a pioneering naturalist. His Natural History and Antiquities of Selborne, first published in 1789, has never been out of print.

Generations later, farmers and volunteers have spent five years walking the same land and discovered 88 of the 120 bird species spotted by White as well as a number of new species, taking the total to 114. This has resulted in Farming in Partnership With Nature - a New Natural History of Selborne, the most comprehensive survey of the landscape since White.

Its authors say it shows the value of wildlife-friendly farming and White's approach to "watching narrowly", by observing local wildlife in detail-however trivial it might seem.

Blackmoor estate, a few kilometres from Gilbert White's house, was arable land until 15 years ago, but the estate's managing director, William Selborne (whose great-great-great-grandfather took the name Selborne in the 19th century) decided he wanted to return it to chalk grassland and link up two nature reserves - Noar Hill and Selborne Common.