side is an area known as Paythorne Down (). The site is over a third of a mile long and has very little scrub except some gorse and thorn at the northern end, and there is strong lynchetting at the southern end, where there was a Roman peasant farm. At the northern end, at the base of the gorsey slope, there was a medieval peasant farm. The site has the rare field fleawort, which flowers in late spring and early summer and is often associated with prehistoric sites. In spring, too, it has cowslip, hairy violet, skylark and meadow pipit, and some lizards. There are not great displays of flowers here, especially because of the year long grazing, but this site has three small snails: the blind snail, the scree snail and the moss snail, all three indicative of the antiquity of this pasture. Clappers Lane Clappers Lane to the east of the parish, running north from Fulking village, was once probably an old swine pasture drove. More recently it was once a place of market gardens and orchards, but it is no longer either as small scale horticulture has suffered from the European competition and the giant economies of scale demanded by the supermarkets and major retail outlets. The Lane takes its name from the early plank (clapper) bridge across the Poynings Stream (). Just north of the bridge over the Poynings Stream and to the east of the Lane is a fine little marsh in a gully () with great tussock sedge, some carnation and black sedge, ragged robin, water figwort, which support a good number of butterfly including common blue and green-veined whites. Governance Civil Parish Fulking Parish Council has five parish councillors. The Parish Council holds an annual meeting (usually in May) and at least three other ordinary meetings a year; additional meetings may be called to discuss planning applications. Meetings are held at Fulking Village Hall. Non-metropolitan district Fulking civil parish is in Hurstpierpoint and Downs Ward of the non-metropolitan district of Mid Sussex; the ward returns three councillors to Mid Sussex District Council. The responsibilities of district councils usually include local planning, housing, local highways, building, environmental health, and refuse collection. However, the parish lies wholly with the South Downs National Park. The planning authority for Fulking is therefore the South Downs National Park Authority (SDNPA), the statutory planning authority for the National Park