St Just In Roseland Church is based on a 13th Century building that was remodelled in the 14th and 15th Centuries and then reworked fairly heavily in a 19th Century restoration.
During Victorian times, the area around the church was landscaped into gardens using semi-tropical species that are able to survive in the mild climate beside the river. The granite blocks alongside the path to the church are inscribed with quotations from the Bible.
The wreck of a wooden boat on the beach beside the church in St Just-in-Roseland was a mackerel handlining boat called "Pride of the Isle" which was abandoned there in the 1930s. Three stone slabs rest on the wooden frame and these may have been used as ballast to keep the boat steady when fishing in rough seas.
The parish of St Just in Roseland was recorded in 1046, just before the Norman invasion, as "Ecciae Sci Juste".
The first records of the settlement around the church are a little later, from 1202, but this used the Cornish name Lansioch. The name contains the Cornish word lann, meaning "enclosed cemetery", which is typical of settlements dating from the Dark Ages. The remainder of the name is thought to be from a Celtic saint's name. It's therefore likely that the church is on the site of an older churchyard, possibly dating from the Dark Ages, and the presence of the Holy Well further supports this.
When maintenance work was carried out on the church in the early 20th Century, a Roman coin was found beneath the floorboards, indicating that there may have been settlement in the vicinity of the church prior to the Dark Ages.
"Holy wells" were created because the Christian church was unhappy with the people continuing their old Pagan ways and worshipping sacred springs. In the 10th Century, the church issued a cannon (law) to outlaw such practices. This didn't work, so they issued another one in the 11th Century, and again in the 12th Century. Even despite the church going to the lengths of building a chapel over the top of some springs to obliterate them, the people still hung onto their sacred springs. The church finally settled on a compromise and rebranded the springs as (Christian) Holy Wells, so the old practices could continue behind a Christian façade.
The name for the Roseland Peninsula derives from the Celtic word ros which can be used to mean a number of things including "moor", but the meaning most applicable in this case is "promontory".
Nettle fibres have been used to make clothing since at least the Bronze Age (textiles made from nettle fibre were found at a Bronze Age site in Denmark). During the First World War, almost all German army uniforms were made from nettles to avoid a shortage of cotton. In more recent years, some European countries have started modern commercial production of nettle-based textiles. A textiles student who produced "nettle knickers" for her university project commented that the fibres are coarser than cotton so it is probably more suited to workwear than underwear.
At low tide, there is a shingle beach here and below a number of other gates along the route, leading on to the shoreline. At high tide, most of the beach is covered.
Blackberries are high in vitamin C, K and antioxidants. The seeds, despite being a bit crunchy, contain omega-3 and -6 fatty acids and further enhance blackberries' "superfood" status.
Bramble flowers produce a lot of nectar so they attract bees and butterflies which spread the pollen between plants. One study found the bramble flowers as the fifth highest nectar producers out of the 175 species studied. Brimstone and Speckled Wood butterflies are particularly fond of bramble flowers.
Bramble seeds are spread very widely by being attached to a tasty blackberry. Mammals, birds, insects and even some fish will eat blackberries. Bramble seeds can survive up to 100 years in the soil, which helps them to colonise recently-cleared land.
The cluster of boats moored on the opposite side of the creek are at Mylor Harbour.
Mylor is the name of the parish but there is not as such a village of Mylor. The closest thing to this are the separate villages of Mylor Bridge, which is the largest in the parish, and Mylor Churchtown which includes the harbour as well as the church.
The headland on this side of the river is Messack Point and there are oyster beds here further up the creeks.
There is evidence as far back as 8700 BC of Stone Age hunter-gatherers harvesting oysters. At Tintagel castle, oyster shells were found in a refuse tip from the "Dark Ages" (Celtic Early Mediaeval period in Cornwall) which have been dated to around the 6th Century. Following the Norman Conquest of 1066, oyster beds were valuable enough to be recorded in the Domesday survey.
There are nice views across the river from this field. The point opposite is Penarrow Point, where the Restronguet Sailing Club are now based.
The Restronguet Sailing Club (RSC) was founded in 1933 and had its first Olympic gold medallist in 1948. By 1965, it had become so popular that it outgrew its location on Restronguet Creek and was relocated to its current position near Mylor Harbour. More recently, Ben Ainslie learned to sail here and went on to win a number of Olympic medals and receive a knighthood.
The Fal estuary is home to a native species of oyster known as the "flat" or "edible" oyster. These are fished sustainably by the last commercial fleet in Europe to use only sails and oars. The fishermen, known as "oyster dredgers" or "dregemen", work the oyster beds with triangular iron dredges which drag along the riverbed as the boat is allowed to drift. The use of non-powered boats is a local bye-law to guarantee the stocks. This has proven effective: the Carrick Roads stocks are as good both in quantity and quality as they were 50 years ago, whilst the Oyster fishing industry has died out on the East coast of England due to overfishing.
Falmouth harbour is one of the largest natural harbours in the world and the deepest in Western Europe. The large waterway of Carrick Roads, forming the junction of seven estuaries, was created after the Ice Age from an ancient valley which flooded with the rising sea levels as the ice caps melted.
During the last Ice Age, up to about 12,000 years ago, ice sheets up to 2 miles thick lay over the northern half of Britain. The weight of this ice was immense and it pressed down onto the Earth's mantle which is a treacle-like liquid rock. The mantle was slowly squished away from beneath the Earth's crust beneath heavy ice. When the ice melted, the pressure was released and the mantle began to flow back creating a super-slow motion rebound effect which will take thousands of years to level out. The result is that the north-western edge of Britain is rising and the south-eastern part is sinking. As South Cornwall has been slowly sinking into the sea over the past few thousand years, this has compounded the rise in sea levels, creating creeks from flooded river valleys.
Where the inlet to Falmouth begins on the opposite side of the bay, the "corner" of the land on this side of it is known as Trefusis Point, after the name of the estate that overlooks it.
King Henry VIII planned to build a castle in the field on Trefusis Point as part of the Falmouth coastal defences to go alongside the castles at St Mawes and Pendennis. However, the funds had to be diverted in order to finance the front line of his wars in France and Scotland, so the castle was never built.
Although the fronds of bracken die back each year, the black underground roots are perennial and spread extensively, sending up fronds at intervals. The root system of one bracken plant can stretch up to a quarter of a mile across making bracken one of the largest plants in the world.
The large, round building on the headland opposite is Pendennis Castle.
Pendennis Castle was built by Henry VIII to defend the coast against a possible French attack and was reinforced during the reign of Elizabeth I. During the English Civil War, more reinforcement took place and the castle withstood five months of siege from Parliamentary forces before it was captured. The castle was adapted for the World Wars of the 20th Century and the guardhouse has been restored to how it might have looked in the First World War. During the Second World War, underground tunnels and magazines were added which can now be visited.
St Anthony's Lighthouse was built out of granite in 1835 on the eastern entrance to Falmouth Harbour to guide vessels clear of the Manacles rocks. In most directions, the light is white but a sector close to The Manacles rocks is coloured red, warning vessels to steer offshore. The lighthouse was featured in the UK version of the TV series "Fraggle Rock" as "Fraggle Rock Lighthouse". Until 1954, the lighthouse possessed a huge bell which hung outside the tower and was used as a fog signal. This was later replaced with a foghorn.
St Mawes Castle is part of the chain of coastal defences built during the reign of King Henry VIII to protect against an invasion threat from Catholic France and Spain after establishing the Church of England. St Mawes' clover-leaf shape was designed so that heavy "ship-sinking" guns could be mounted to face in three directions and together with Pendennis Castle could protect the important anchorage of Carrick Roads. Whereas Pendennis was further developed after Tudor times, St Mawes was not. Thus it is one of the best preserved of these fortresses and is also the most elaborately decorated of them all.
The quay at St Mawes dates from mediaeval times. The first record of it is from 1539 and there are many records of repairs during the 17th Century. It was also rebuilt at least twice during Victorian times.
The holy well is a short diversion up the alley between the Ship and Castle and Victory Inn. When you reach the top, bear right and the well is the arch on your left. You can descend Bohella road to return to the harbour a little further along.
St Mawes Holy Well dates from mediaeval times, possibly when there was a Celtic graveyard here. The age of the stonework around the well is the subject of debate, but is thought to be from either the 14th or 15th Century. In Victorian times the well was described as being "arched over" so that visitors could use it as a wishing well and drop pins into the water. In the 1930s, the well-house was rebuilt and the site was re-dedicated.
The settlement of St Mawes originally had a Cornish name which was first recorded as Lavada in 1284 and last recorded in 1502 as Lavousa, after which it died out and was replaced by St Mawes. The Cornish name is thought to have originally started with Lan, which implies it was a Dark Ages religious settlement.
As you go around the corner, there is a view across the creek to Place house, behind which is St Anthony's church.
The parish church of St Anthony was established by the Augustinian Priory of Plympton and was built in 1150 and included a priory alongside, where Place house is now located. After the dissolution of the monasteries in 1538, part of the priory was used as a residence and other parts were pulled down and the stone was used to build St Mawes Castle. Despite being extensively restored in the 19th century, the church still retains its original mediaeval plan.
Polvarth Quay was built by the American troops in WW2 in preparation for D-Day. It was used for training, leading up to the event. Meanwhile, the BBC ran a competition for French holiday photographs which were used to gather intelligence on suitable beaches to land the troops. Submariners then visited the candidate beaches at night to take soil samples. On D-Day, Polvarth Quay was used as an embarkation point for troops.
During late winter or early spring, if you encounter a patch of plants with white bell-shaped flowers, smelling strongly of onions, and with long, narrow leaves then they are likely to be three-cornered leeks. Once you're familiar with their narrow, ridged leaves, you'll be able to spot these emerging from late October onwards.
All parts of the plant are edible by humans and the flavour of the leaves is relatively mild so they can be used in recipes in place of spring onions or chives. They are at their best for culinary use from November to April. By mid-May, they have flowered and the leaves are starting to die back.
The long leaves can be mistaken for bluebells or daffodils which are both poisonous but do not smell of onions. However, fingers that have previously picked 3-cornered leeks also smell of onions and so mistakes have been made this way.
Once pollinated, in late summer, the wild arum produces clusters of bright orange berries on stalks. Despite being very pretty, these are poisonous and cause skin irritation so children should be warned not to pick them.
All members of the lily family, including wild arum, are poisonous to dogs.
You may remember from school geography lessons that the faster-flowing water around the outside of the bend causes a meander in a river to slowly grow as the outside edge is eroded and sediment is deposited on the inside by slower-moving water. At this point, your school geography teacher probably got excited about ox-bow lakes and never got around to explaining exactly why the water flows faster on the outside in the first place. So that you don't go to your grave feeling short-changed, an attempt at an explanation follows...
Flowing water piles into the outside of the bend and creates a higher pressure there. Close to the riverbed, water is moving very slowly so the high pressure pushes water across the bottom from the outside to the inside. This drags the faster-moving water across the top of the river to the outside to take its place. This spiralling current both erodes the outside edge with faster-moving water and also transports the sediment back across the bottom to the inside
The quay associated with the boatyard was built during the first half of the 20th Century and is thought may have been constructed as part of the preparations for D-Day landings together with the other quay at Polvarth.
The Ramblers Association and National Farmers Union suggest some "dos and don'ts" for walkers which we've collated with some info from the local Countryside Access Team.
Do
Don't
Red Campion seeds ripen between June and August. The seed capsule has teeth at the end which fold back when the seeds are ripe, allowing them to escape when it is shaken by the wind (known in botanical circles as "the pepper pot mechanism"). Each seed weighs only one thousandth of a gram, allowing it to be carried as far as possible by the wind. Nevertheless many end up falling quite close to the parent which is why red campion often occurs as a cluster of plants.
Primroses prefer moist soils so they tend to grow either in semi-shady places which don't get dried out too much by the sun such as woodland clearings and the base of hedgerows, or in wet open ground such as near streams.
Wood anemones can be recognised by their white star-like flowers growing in shady locations during the spring. Hoverflies are important pollinators of the plant so you may also see these nearby. Avoid touching the plants as they are poisonous to humans and can cause severe skin irritation.
The anemones grow from underground stems (rhizomes) and spread very slowly - to spread by six feet takes about 100 years! This makes it a good indicator of ancient woodland.
Wood from the oak has a lower density than water (so it floats) but has a great strength and hardness, and is very resistant to insect and fungal attack because of its high tannin content. This made it perfect for shipbuilding.
The Cornish name for the bird is rudhek from rudh = "red" (in Cornish, "dh" is pronounced like the "th" in "with"). Cornish place names like Bedruthan, Ruthern and Redruth are all based on the colour red.
Hemlock (also known as water dropwort or poison hemlock) is a member of the carrot family (related to cow parsley and alexanders) and is common in damp, shady places, particularly near streams. The stems are tubular and quite thick like alexanders and the leaves look quite like coriander (more toothed on the edges than alexanders). New leaves begin to shoot in early winter and by February these are starting to grow into quite noticeable small plants. It flowers in April and May with white flowers similar to cow parsley.
During winter, from November to March, winter heliotrope is visible along the edges of roads and paths as carpets of rounded heart-shaped leaves.
The name of the plant is Greek for "sun direction" because the flowers turn to follow the winter sun.
Some estimates suggest the UK has up to half of the world's total bluebell population; nowhere else in the world do they grow in such abundance. However, the poor bluebell faces a number of threats including climate change and hybridisation from garden plants. In the past, there has also been large-scale unsustainable removal of bulbs for sale although it is now a criminal offence to remove the bulbs of wild bluebells with a fine up to £5,000 per bulb!
The inner bark of the tree carries sugars created by photosynthesis down from the leaves to feed the rest of the tree. The inner bark dies over time to produce the outer bark which protects the living part of the tree.
Ivy is unusual in that it flowers particularly late in the year - from September to November - and therefore provides vital nectar for insects such as bees and moths. Ivy berries are an important winter food source for birds and will remain on the plant all the way through the winter until spring. The berries also have a high fat content so provide a dense source of energy at a time when animals need lots to keep warm.
The settlement here is called Nanshuttal and was first recorded in 1327. It contains the Cornish word nans, meaning valley, but the origin of the rest of the name is not known.
Tregear Vean was first documented in 1697 although it is thought to be much older, dating to the mediaeval period, if not before. The name Tregear is from from the Cornish word ker, meaning fort or earthwork and Vean means "small" in Cornish and survived for a long time in the local dialect, even when English replaced Cornish as the spoken language (e.g. "E'm only a vean child"). The gist of the name is therefore thought to be "little farm by the fort". However, no trace of an earthwork has so far been found so it has been postulated that "Little Tregear" might be in relation to the (main) Tregear in Gerrans Parish.
The large area of houses on the far side of the river is Falmouth.
In Elizabethan times, the town of Falmouth did not exist, only a few small settlements around Carrick Roads which had been there since mediaeval times. A few castles had been built during the Tudor period to defend the river system and there was a manor house of Arwenack which was owned by Sir John Killigrew. When Sir Walter Raleigh visited Arwenack in 1598, he was so impressed with the natural harbour of Carrick Roads that he recommended that it should be developed as a port. Following this, the town of Falmouth was created in 1613.
The Carrick Roads area of the estuary is roughly a mile across. There are good views across the estuary from the fields here to Mylor Creek (with the yachts) and Restronguet Creek (next creek upriver).
The name "Carrick Roads" is thought to be a mangling of the Cornish Karrek Reun meaning "seal rock". It is now known as "Black Rock" and located in the centre of the harbour entrance, between Pendennis Point and Carricknath Point, and marked with a large conical beacon. It is still used at low tide as a haul-out spot by seals.
The small inlet further upriver from Restronguet Creek with a large white building on the point is Pill Creek at Feock. Above this the Fal estuary narrows to around one-fifth of the width of the Carrick Roads area.
The outer area of creek on this side of the river now in view is known as St Just Pool which leads into St Just Creek where the church is located. On the opposite side is Messack Point which is owned by the National Trust.
If you had done this walk in 1992, a shocking orange plume of pollution would have been visible, stretching down Carrick Roads.
After the pumps at the Wheal Jane mine were finally switched off in 1991, the rising water flooded the former working areas and exposed ore, picking up waste and dissolving the minerals. It turned out that Wheal Jane is connected to a number of unsurveyed 18th century workings, into which the rising water also flooded. In 1992, the acid mine drainage escaped through surface water systems into the Carnon Valley, and an orange plume of pollution flowed down Restronguet Creek into Carrick Roads, killing fish. Remedial measures were fairly quickly put in place to stop the pollution which have now been replaced by longer-term measures.
Greater stitchwort and lesser stitchwort both grow in similar places but they are fairly easy to tell apart. The flowers of greater stitchwort are larger (2-3cm across whereas lesser stitchwort flowers are often less than 1cm across) and the petals are rounded at the tips (lesser stitchwort petals have pointy ends). Greater stitchwort also flowers earlier in the year (from mid-March) although the flowering times of the two species do overlap in May.
Keeping the pollution from leaking back into the creek system requires continued effort.
At the time of writing, the ongoing cost of preventing pollution escaping from Wheal Jane is around £2 million per year.
However, in the areas flooded with mine waste, scientists have found naturally-occurring algae that absorb many of the metals dissolved in the water. It is not yet understood which species absorb which metals, but it is hoped with some more research and development that it will be possible to extract the metals commercially from the algae and then use the waste organic matter for biofuel. If successful, the approach could be used worldwide to turn what is currently an expensive environmental problem into something that may even generate revenue.
Swallows forage for insects on the wing, typically around 7-8 metres above the ground, but will skim over the surface of the ground if that's where the insects are. They can sometimes be seen skimming the surface of water either to drink or to bathe which they also do in flight.
Due to blackthorn wood's toughness, it was used to make tool handles, walking sticks and as a traditional Celtic weapon for clubbing people to death! It is still regarded as the ultimate wood for making walking sticks. Once cut and trimmed, the wood needs to be dried for at least a year (often several) which allows moisture to escape and the wood to shrink and harden.
One in five of all known fungi form lichens. Studies suggest that many species of fungi that form lichens started out from ancestors that lived on organic waste. Fossils have also revealed that the symbiosis between algae and fungi dates back more than 400 million years roughly to the time when plants first evolved from green algae.
The two gateways into the churchyard at St Just in Roseland, were originally built in 1632. From their condition, it is thought that they might have been rebuilt in the 19th Century, possibly as part of the restoration of the church. The gateways are known as lychgates after the Saxon word lych, meaning corpse.
The Hottentot Fig (Carpobrotus edulis), was once classified as a Mesembryanthemum but as plant genetics were better understood, was found to be a close relative but in a different sub-family of the larger ice-plant family. They are called ice plants due to hairs on the leaves which refract sunlight and make them sparkle. The plant is native to South Africa and was originally grown ornamentally in gardens but has subsequently gone feral and settled on the coastline where it thrives in sandy soils, helped by its resistance to wind and salt. It forms a dense mat which crowds out other species and is therefore considered invasive.
The Cornwall Heritage Trust (CHT) is a charity founded in 1985 to preserve and strengthen Cornish heritage. The CHT own some historic structures such as the Treffry Viaduct and also manage a number of state-owned English Heritage sites in Cornwall such as Carn Euny.
The CHT management of some of the smaller English Heritage sites follows controversy in 1999 when the Revived Cornish Stannary Parliament pressure group removed several English Heritage signs. CHT now manage these in partnership with local communities, Natural England, Historic England and English Heritage.
As part of the English Heritage partnership, members of the Cornwall Heritage Trust can visit the larger English Heritage sites in Cornwall (Tintagel Castle, Restormel Castle, Launceston Castle, Pendennis Castle, Chysauster etc) free-of-charge. CHT annual membership is therefore quite an economical option for anyone intending to visit multiple English Heritage sites solely in Cornwall. The family membership is particularly good value-for-money.
Summers Beach is part of the small bay forming St Mawes harbour and is St Mawes' main beach. There is a narrow strip of beach at high tide which is shingle. As the tide goes out the shingle gives way to finer sand and some areas of rock are exposed with rockpools. The beach faces southwest, directly into the afternoon sun.
Rooks can be distinguished from other members of the crow family by their pale, hairless, pointy beak (other members of the crow family have black beaks and also a moustache on the top of their beak).
Rooks nest in colonies and are one of the most social members of the crow family. Scientists have found that rooks are happy to work cooperatively to solve problems (e.g. each pulling on a separate string to release food).
Experiments have shown that rooks are able to use tools to solve problems, choosing tools with optimal sizes and shapes to solve a problem. They are also able to adapt tools e.g. bending a wire to make a hook to retrieve food.
Rooks eat pretty much anything but their primary food source is earthworms and insect larvae which their beak is evolved to probe for.
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