Marshwood Vale

[puddleshark]

In any normal year, it would not be wise to go walking in the Marshwood Vale in March. It lives up to its name.

Due to the poorly-draining nature of its clay soil, until modern times the vale maintained a reputation for being difficult to traverse in wet weather. In 1906 Sir Frederick Treves called it "marshy and full of trees" and quoted the Dorset historian John Hutchins (1698 - 1773) who said it "was hardly passable by travellers but in dry summers", whilst in 1965 the Dorset-born agriculturalist and broadcaster Ralph Wightman remembered that in his boyhood in the early twentieth century "after months of hopeless winter rain .... little farms across the fields were cut off in desperate poverty and loneliness". Mains water and electricity didn't reach the vale until the second half of the 20th century, and ploughing with horses was still common in the 1960s.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marshwood_Vale

But after an unusually dry February and March, even the fields of the Marshwood Vale have dried out.




Set off from Whitchurch Canonicorum in the sunshine. The forecast had been for occasional showers, so I took my little wet weather camera. Occasionally the sky clouded over in an ominous fashion, but it never rained, and mostly it was a glorious day for walking, the sunshine just warm enough to balance out the sharp March wind.


From the churchyard, a little secret Path of Celandines beside a stream...


...which brings you out by the start of the bridleway to Mandeville Stoke Farm.

In the first field I crossed, a farmer in her lambing gear was separating a ewe and twin lambs from the flock, and gently shepherding them through a gateway. I stood still a little way behind her, as a deterrent to stop the ewe running back, until the ewe and her lambs were in their new field.


The Marshwood Vale, surrounded by gentle hills. The fields are all "improved" livestock pasture these days, a vivid nitrogen-fertilized green, so this is not the walk to take if you are hunting for cowslips. But the ancient hedges with their oaks have survived, as have the little copses where the rooks nest. Wrens sing from the tangled hedges. Roe deer go bounding across the fields.




Ouch. The vale is green, but not that green. The Pentax has a tendency to over-saturate landscapes in bright weather...

It's a gentle landscape, but I still wouldn't say it's an easy place to walk. There are no well-trodden paths to follow through the fields. You just have to set off towards a distant gate, hoping that there will be a yellow arrow painted on the gatepost to give you a clue. I relied heavily on my OS map and my compass. At one point, I couldn't find the path I had intended to follow - it existed on the map, but showed no signs of existing in real life. I took another path instead. Luckily there are a lot of footpaths in the Marshwood Vale, and even if you have to detour, you can eventually get to your destination.

Near Lodgehouse Farm, passed under the row of pylons. They mar the old-fashioned landscape, but when you're navigating by OS map, they make for an unmissable landmark.


Over the Bridge of Wonk. Very cautiously. It is a little decrepit, but it bore my weight. Then, holding a big stick, crept cautiously round the edge of a field full of young dairy cattle. Fortunately it was a very big field, and the cattle were far enough away not to catch sight of me. The cattle are out to grass early this year, and I'll have to be a bit careful on my walks for the next few months. Being chased by young cattle, although very much part of Dorset life, is just too much excitement for me these days.



Joined the lane just south of Shave Cross, and headed south.






Most of the farms have names ending in 'hay', from the Old English word haeg meaning 'enclosure', dating from the medieval period when the land was partly forested.

I had originally planned to join the Monarch's Way long distance footpath, and head up over the hills to Ryall. But only halfway round the walk, found myself suddenly running out of steam. Decided the hills would still be there another day. And stayed on the lane, which makes it way, eventually, after some winding about the countryside, back to Whitchurch Canonicorum.




A quiet pretty lane, at this time of year lined with primroses, lesser celandines, violets.




Cutty Stubbs Farm (etymology: Cuthay Stubbs 1811 OS , named from Cuthay Farm in Whitchurch Canonicorum. par. infra, v. stubb 'tree-stump').


Plenty Cottage, next to Plenty House, just down the road from Peace Farm.




Back at Whitchurch Canonicorum, sat for a while in the sunshine in the churchyard. Robins singing. Tiny Goldcrests darting about in the yew branches. Before I left, I stepped into the church to say hello to St. Wite, the mysterious Anglo-saxon saint, whose relics are contained within a shrine (one of the few in England to have survived the Reformation). The church is one of the most beautiful in Dorset.

If you want a glimpse inside, I took some pictures back in 2015.


Detail from the splendid 1611 memorial to John Jeffery.




We all have days when we want to bite things...

Comments

[sartorias]

Very broody scenery. I loved the photos of the church interior. Fascinating!

[puddleshark]

It is such a lovely church, full of history. And it somehow managed to escape the curse of dark & gloomy Victorian stained glass (perhaps because it was such a poor parish...)

[nikonf3]

These are all lovely shots.

"a vivid nitrogen-fertilized green,"
One time we drove Highway 50 across Nevada. It was all very dry and brown. Coming into Fallon, I saw a pasture the color you are describing. What I once would have considered verdant, now looked artificial and ghastly.

[puddleshark]

Thank you!

Yes. The Dorset landscape has always been lush and green, but slowly we have lost all our hay meadows and water meadows and wild flower meadows, and have gained a landscape that is a universal artificial astro-turf green.