Welcome to the Rudloe and environs website.
Here you will find news, articles and photos of an area that straddles the Cotswold Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty in north-west Wiltshire.
Contributions in the form of articles or photos are welcome. Even those with completely contrary views to mine!
Thanks to the website builder 1&1 and Rob Brown for the original idea.
Rudloescene now, in January 2014, has a sister, academic rather than anarchic, website about Box history here: http://www.boxpeopleandplaces.co.uk/
It contains thoroughly professional, well-researched articles about Box and its people.
Contact rudloescene through the 'Contact' page.
Walks in the Time of Covid ... just about. It's the 22nd June 2020 in Leafy Lane Wood and this Bath asparagus is in full bloom while others are just 'going over' (see pictures in gallery below). On the Leafy Lane flora/fauna page here: https://www.rudloescene.co.uk/localities/rudloe/leafy-lane-flora-fauna/ you may find more detail of this scarce plant including "This very restricted distribution, exacerbated by its large seeds which make dispersal difficult, has led to Bath asparagus being recognised as a nationally scarce species in the UK and also protected under the Wildlife and Countryside Act (1981)"
We have our own Rudloe Banksy in Highlands Close
In the lime avenue, Leafy Lane Wood
The main right of way, BOX107A, in Leafy Lane Wood
Young brambles in Leafy Lane Wood
One of three hornbeams at the north-east corner of Leafy Lane Wood. Incredibly, the 'experts' commissioned by Bewley & Merrett to report on the state of the wood, failed to identify these trees (and Lord knows what else).
Midsummer on that most important green. Can you imagine that Wiltshire Council would sanction its destruction through the building of flats here?
Unidentified variety of blackcurrant growing at the site of the felled and poisoned sycamore at the south-eastern corner of Rudloe
Oh dear, oh dear ... it looks like poor old David Gibbons was ripped off by Redcliffe for these 30 acres - they gave him only five-million quid. Bellway paid a similar amount to the Paynes (Park Farm, Colerne) for the 10-acre 'Dickens Gate' field.
The maple avenue at Hudswell 'Common' on 22nd June 2020
Looks like parkland but this is the byway (CORM133) leading to Spring Lane (from Hudswell)
And here is Spring Lane with my proposed route to Westwells up some steps to the right
... and here are the steps leading to right of way CORM60
A patch of hedge bedstraw (Galium mollugo) adjacent to right of way CORM60 at Westwells
In another location, this would be a fly-tip but this is on private property (see paragraph below) to the west of Spring Lane. Perhaps it is a fly-tip?
Through a Land Registry enquiry, we find that the land (to the west of Spring Lane) shown in the 'fly-tip' photograph above is owned by Patrick Quinn Wyles and Alan Keith Wyles of Wingfield. Perhaps this is debris from the shamelessly inappropriate (for a Cotswold hamlet) new-build at the corner of Westwells and Spring Lane (or perhaps it is a fly-tip?). Just an aside but in the Charges Register of the Land Registry documents, the following transaction (from 1958) was found: ' ...between the said William Fleetwood Fuller George Edward Hunter Fell and Arthur Hugh Brabazon Talbot-Ponsonby of the one part and the said County Council of the other part'.
This is what the rest of the Wyles' property looks like - unimproved grassland and trees - excellent ...
... just the kind of environment to wander through and enjoy at midsummer
And now we head for Thorneypits along BOX49 (Spring Quarry spoil heap at right)
The trees and scrub at the foot of the old Spring Quarry spoil heap which became part of the HMS Royal Arthur Petty Officer Training School assault course (trivia ... did you know that the PO Training School was originally at Skegness)
Hmmm ... Belarusian cigarette packet discarded in the Bradford Road verge. The story of Belarusian cigarettes may be found here: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-38170754
Not long for this world - Inverness Terrace's 168-home development will soon change the landscape at former RAF Rudloe No. 2 Site
And talking of development, the mercenary behaviour of local landowners, the Paynes of Park Farm at Colerne, continues with a planning application for four homes at 'the Barn' in Bradford Road ... see the paragraph below
Incredibly, after receiving almost five million quid for the farmland (see many articles and photos elsewhere) which has become the Dickens Gate development, the Paynes of Park Farm, Colerne continue their sordid, avaricious behaviour through an application to surround the old barn on the Bradford Road with two pairs of semi-detached houses. There is much misinformation (or perhaps disinformation) in the application which will be revealed in a (my) representation to Wiltshire Council planners. Let's look at just one of their 'misrepresentations' here ... through their agent, they say that the verge here and the trees and hedgerow thereon are theirs and so they propose to remove the trees in order to improve sightlines to/from the proposed entrance. I suppose this is typical of such people ... the more they get (five million quid) the more they want, so they propose a 'land grab' hoping that no one will notice. Well someone has noticed ... that verge is not theirs, it is part of the extensive property portfolio in the Corsham area of Defence Estates. To use the vernacular ... what a bloody nerve these people have.
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