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.
The annual pilgrimage to Monks Wood on 14th May 2022 which I feared was a tad late as the wild garlic is usually at its best in the first or second week of the month. However, weather conditions must have delayed the flowering.
On the Weavern byway heading for Monks Wood
On the Weavern byway, we see Monks Wood in the distance with the abandoned Weavern Farm below (to the left of the post)
Hemlock water dropwort lines the banks of the By Brook tributary at Weavern - the Weavern byway beyond
MacMillan Way at Weavern close to the entrance to Monks Wood
The track leading into Monks Wood from the south (Weavern)
Wild garlic in flower above the principal track through the wood
Wild garlic around one of the many formerly coppiced trees in the wood - this is an elm
The main track through the wood has been widened since last year - apparently to allow better vehicular access for tree felling
The widened main track through the wood
Ramsons above the main track through the wood
What delights lie beyond the bend?
The aroma of wild garlic pervades the air throughout the wood
Another coppiced tree in a sea of wild garlic
The main track continues through the wood
A bank of wild garlic - picked a few leaves for a salad here
The ramsons runs around pendulous sedge in this part of the wood
The wild garlic pervades the woodland below the main track
As well as garlic leaves for salad, we have nettles for soup here
The canopy overshadows the blooms and the track narrows
A wych elm by the main track
A bank of ramsons
Monks Wood constitutes the western bank of the By Brook to the north of Weavern
Not apparent from this image but this is the steep western bank of the By Brook close to Weavern
This image indicates the pitch of the slope - the By Brook lies below
Another view of the western bank of the By Brook in Monks Wood. Trees have also been coppiced here.
And yet another view of the western bank of the By Brook showing the steepness of the slope in Monks Wood
Coppiced tree and steep slope
Here the view is reversed, with the western bank of the By Brook to the left
The By Brook above Weavern Bridge
The abandoned Weavern Farm - this year's herd are sheltering in the barn at left
The Weavern fish pond project appears to have been abandoned for the moment
An odd mix: horsetail, knapweed and aquilegia in the pile of earth removed from the old fish pond
Oaks reaching for the sky in The Larches woodland
Heading down to Weavern, I received nervous licks from a couple of these youngsters
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