The ruin next to the NCI lookout at Polruan is of St Saviour's chapel, originally built in the 8th or 9th Centuries. The chapel, originally quite small, was enlarged, possibly by Sir Richard Edgcumbe in 1488, to a building with a nave, three large windows and a tower. The chapel had become an important navigational marker, and a beacon was lit on the tower during the night. The tower also served as a lookout to spot enemy ships approaching to attack the port of Fowey. After 1572 the chapel fell into ruin following the dissolution of the monasteries.
The coastguard lookout is run by the National Coastwatch Institution.
The National Coastwatch Institution was set up to restore visual watches along the UK coastline after two Cornish fishermen lost their lives within sight of an empty Coastguard lookout in 1994. The first station - at Bass Point on The Lizard, where the fishermen had died - opened in December 1994. The organisation, staffed by volunteers, now runs 50 lookout stations around England and Wales.
Furze Park takes its name from the gorse growing along the coast.
Flower scents are volatile organic compounds which drift though the air and has evolved as an advertisement to pollinating insects that nectar is available. Squeezing the flowers releases these compounds onto the surface where they can evaporate and therefore intensifies the smell. Similarly the warming effect of sunlight helps the compounds to evaporate faster and so the smell is more intense on sunny days.
Gorse is also known (particularly in the Westcountry) as furze from the Middle English word furs. This itself is from the Old English word fyres, closely related to the Old English word for fire.
Insects are the most diverse group of organisms with around 900,000 known living species. This makes up 80% of all the world's known species. However it is thought that even today there are still more unknown species than known ones with estimates of the total number of insect species in the range 2 - 30 million.
The hawthorn trees along the path have been shaped by the wind and consequently point northeast, away from the prevailing southwesterlies.
As well as its thorns, another thing that makes hawthorn good for hedging is its very rapid rate of growth of around half a metre per year. Consequently one of the alternative common names for it is "quickthorn".
Skylarks are the most common member of the lark family in Britain and are often known simply as "larks".
Almost all European countries have reported a rapid decline in lark numbers over recent years. In Britain, two-thirds of the population has disappeared in 30 years. This is thought mainly to be due to intensive agriculture and particularly the autumn sowing of cereals. When cereals were sown in the spring, the fields of stubble that remained after harvest provided an environment where larks could nest during the winter.
To make sloe gin, wash your sloes and prick each one with a fork. Put your pricked sloes into a container with a lid and a suitably large neck so you can pour them out later - 4 litre milk containers, washed out very thoroughly, are ideal. Fill about 80% of the way to the top with the cheapest gin you can find (don't waste your money on expensive gin as you are about to transform it into something altogether different). Fill the remaining 20% with white sugar (it looks a lot but sloes are incredibly bitter and this offsets it) and leave to infuse for a few months; agitate gently occasionally to help the sugar dissolve without mashing the sloes which would make your drink cloudy. Drain the beautiful red liquid into a decanter to admire before consumption.
A few different factors all combine to vary the colour of the sea:
A glass in your hand might lure you into thinking otherwise, but pure water is faintly blue. The main wavelengths that the chemical bonds in water absorb are either in the infra-red or ultra-violet, and not in the visible spectrum, which is why a glass of pure water does not look coloured. However one fairly obscure harmonic of the vibrations in the water molecule corresponds to the wavelength of red light and so water very weakly absorbs the red from white light, giving it a very slightly blue tinge. If there is enough water, both the blue tinge and reflection of blue light by any suspended particles make it look blue.
Another factor is that the surface of the ocean acts as a mirror and reflects the colour of the sky and this is why it may appear grey under a cloudy sky. Under a blue sky, this intensifies the blueness.
In shallow water, the sand which is golden in Cornwall due to fragments of seashell, reflects yellow light and this combines with the blue from seawater to generate colours from green to turquoise. The ocean also sometimes appears green due to the presence of planktonic plant life.
The Cornish language has a word glas (often appearing in place names as "glaze") which is the Swiss Army Knife of sea colour descriptions. It means blue, or green, or grey.
Some of the tourism literature used to say that the green colour of the sea in Cornwall was due to copper dissolved in the water. This is total nonsense. In order to be visible, the concentration of copper salts have to be incredibly high which would never happen with an entire Atlantic Ocean to dilute it. The highest copper levels are found in estuaries fed by rivers into which mines drain. Here there is at most in the order of a few micrograms per litre and this is carefully monitored by the Environment Agency.
The English Channel is thought to have been formed by two catastrophic floods from lakes that built up behind a dam of ice. The first was about 425,000 years ago and broke through a range of chalk mountains between the Weald and Artois. Then about 225,000 years ago, a second ice-dammed lake at the end of the Rhine broke through another weak barrier and created another massive flood channel. The waterfalls during these floods are thought to have created plunge pools around 100 metres deep and several kilometres across.
The crescent shape of Lantic Bay shelters it from the wind and its white, sandy beaches face south towards the sun. Within the bay, the main beach - Great Lantic Beach - is accessible via a flight of steps. At low tide, this joins to the other beaches in the bay - Little Lantic Beach on one side and some small coves on the other. As the tide comes in, these are cut off and there is no path up from them, so care should be taken in exploring them.
Sea Kale grows in the shingle along the top of Great Lantic Beach.
Sea Kale is a member of the cabbage family which can be seen growing near the top of a few shingle beaches in Cornwall. It is now a protected plant.
In the past, the plant sea kale was harvested by burying the emerging leaves in shingle during the spring. The pale stems are then steamed and eaten like asparagus. The reason for burying them is that when the stems are exposed to sunlight, the plant releases signalling molecules which not only trigger development of the green chlorophyll but also bitter chemicals to discourage herbivores from eating them.
Mermaids purses are the egg cases of the shark family and are sometimes found washed up on the seashore. They are usually light brown, approximately rectangular and fairly flat, with curly strands on 4 corners. At first glance they could be mistaken for a piece of kelp or a melted piece of plastic. The strands attach to seaweeds to lodge the egg case in a safe environment for the baby shark or skate to develop.
The hills in the distance are the Cornish Alps.
The china clay area around St Austell is affectionately known as the "Cornish Alps" due to the peaks formed by the sky tips. The lakes created by the settling ponds also add to the alpine appearance. During the early 1970s there was even an English China Clay ski club using the sandy slopes!
The edges of fields are typically less productive areas (e.g. due to the shade from hedges) so for purely economic reasons a margin was sometimes left around the main crop. However, field margins have been found to play such a crucial role for protecting soil and water and enhancing biodiversity on farms that there are now legislative requirements for farmers to maintain uncropped field margins.
More than 150 plants are characteristic of arable land but due to agricultural intensification, these and the insects and birds which depend on them have declined. The field margins are areas where these biologically important weeds can thrive.
When fields are ploughed and tilled, rainwater can wash the loose soil out of the fields. The vegetation on margins acts as a barrier and strains out many of the particles of soil from the rainwater.
When fertilisers are applied to the crops in the field, the margin helps to reduce the amount drifting over the hedges when it is applied. The plants around the margin then act as a sponge, helping to hoover up nutrients that wash off the crop.
The church is dedicated to St Wyllow who according to legend was born in Ireland in the 6th Century, lived as a hermit in Cornwall and was beheaded by the locals. The current church was built in the 14th Century and altered in the 15th. The brass of Thomas de Mohun within the church dates from this period and the brasses depicting John Mohun and his wife date from the start of the 16th Century. The bench ends were also carved in the 16th Century and carefully preserved during an 18th Century restoration. Daphne du Maurier featured the church as "Lanoc Church" in her first novel, "The Loving Spirit" and she was married here herself in 1932.
Daphne du Maurier was born in London in 1907 and began writing from an early age. Her parents were in the theatre, which helped her to launch her literary career. The family visited Cornwall for holidays and bought a second home at Bodinnick in 1926. In 1943 Daphne moved to Cornwall full-time where she spent the majority of her life.
Bluebells grow in the woodland which is an indicator that the woodland is ancient.
Bluebells are extremely poisonous, containing a number of biologically-active compounds and were used (probably with varying success) in mediaeval medicine. The sap was used as a glue for book-binding as its toxicity repelled insects. It was also used to attach the fletchings onto arrows.
A mature tree can absorb tens of kilograms of carbon dioxide each year adding up to a tonne over a number of decades. However, burning one litre of petrol produces just over 2kg of carbon dioxide so it takes about half an acre of trees to absorb the average amount of carbon dioxide produced by one car in a year. When trees die and decompose, the majority of the carbon is gradually released back into the atmosphere depending on how fast the various bits of tree rot (the woody parts take longer).
The path you have just joined that leads to Polruan is known as the Hall Walk.
Hall Manor, just above Bodinnick, was built in the 13th century. An ornamental promenade was created which ran from the manor to Penleath Point and dates back to at least the 16th Century. It was described by Richard Carew in 1585 as:
cut out in the side of a steepe hill….evenly levelled, to serve for bowling, floored with sand, for soaking up the rayne, closed with two thorne hedges, and banked with sweete senting flowers: It wideneth to a sufficient breadth, for the march of five or sixe in front, and extendeth, to not much lesse, then halfe a London mile …..and is converted on the foreside, into platformes, for the planting of Ordinance, and the walkers sitting; and on the back part, into summer houses, for their more private retrait and recreation.
One of the summer houses remains on the point, containing a row of benches. Later, the path was extended to Polruan. The full length of this is now known as the "Hall Walk" but originally the name would have probably just referred to the promenade to Penleath Point.
The land for the walk was given to the National Trust as a joint memorial to Sir Arthur Quiller Couch and the men of Fowey and Polruan who had died during the Second World War.
During the Second World War, about 28,000 concrete fortifications were built across England and around 6,500 of these still survive. The hexagonal blockhouses known as "pillboxes" are assumed by many to have been named after similarly-shaped containers for medical pills. However, commentary on early models during the First World War suggests the origin of the name is actually from "pillar box", based on the slots for machine guns resembling a postbox.
Polruan is located in the lee of the prevailing winds within the Fowey estuary and is therefore a very sheltered natural harbour. The settlement originated as a small fishing village and later became a centre for boat building. The name is associated with St Ruan, who is said to have settled on the hill above Polruan during early mediaeval times.
During the 6th century AD, an enclosed settlement was established at Fowey by a small religious community containing a small church and dwellings. Fowey developed its fishing and sea trading industries during the Middle Ages and by 1260, was the most important port in Cornwall, taking over from Lostwithiel when the river silted up as a result of streaming for tin in the river valleys. Fowey was a busy port even during the 20th Century with china clay taking over from the ore exports after the tin and copper prices collapsed in the late 19th century, and china clay exports continue although on a smaller scale than previously.
The location of Fowey close to the mouth of the estuary made it vulnerable to attack by sea. The town was destroyed by fire during invasions by French, Spanish and other pirate ships in 1330, 1380 and 1457. Following the 1380 raid, blockhouses were built on either side of the estuary mouth. A chain spanned between them that could be raised to close the channel in times of need. The chain was later confiscated by the King after boats from Fowey and Polruan were convicted of Piracy.
The white wooden cross that stands on the rocks at the entrance to Fowey harbour is known as Punches Cross and is thought to date from the mediaeval period (although the wood has obviously been replaced a few times over the years). Its original purpose was probably a boundary marker indicating the limit of the jurisdiction of the Prior of Tywardreath and it quickly proved useful to navigators. It was mentioned in 1525 and is marked in early navigational charts. It is now maintained by Fowey Harbour Commission and is still an important navigational aid as well as a handy perch for seagulls.
On the seaward side of the wall on Peak Point is the base of a gun battery, which may have been in use as early as the 17th Century. By 1860 there were four guns installed here with a further two on the Fowey side of the estuary to cover the entrance to the harbour. The area was also used for naval training and a drill hut was located where Hoe Cottage is situated now. The wall behind the battery was originally three times its current height and was used as a firing range for rifle practice.
The name of the River Fowey is from Fowydh, based on the Cornish word for tree, gwydh, and more specifically beech, fawen.
Ferns evolved a long time before flowering plants and dominated the planet during the Carboniferous period. The bark from tree ferns during this period is thought to have been the main source of the planet's coal reserves.
Fern fronds form in a coil (known as a crozier or fiddlehead) with the delicate tip protected in the centre. As the outer parts begin to photosynthesise, the sugars they produce cause more water to be drawn into the leaf, causing it to expand and gradually unfurl.
Ferns produce 2 different types of leaf (although they often look quite similar). The normal leaves are used for photosynthesis of sugars just like in other plants. Ferns also produce a special kind of spore-bearing leaf which can often be identified from the dots on the underside. In hart's tongue ferns, these are really obvious.
Ferns produce neither flowers nor seeds and rely on the tiny spores for their reproduction which are most commonly distributed by the wind. This allows them to colonise some quite random places such as rocky ledges that heavier seeds might not reach. Since the spores come from just one parent fern, the offspring is a genetic clone.
The spore from a fern doesn't grow into a fern. Instead it grows into an organism resembling a liverwort (i.e. a small green blob). Instead of producing spores, these produce eggs and also sperm which they interchange with neighbouring blobs to get a new mix of genes. The fertilised egg grows into a new fern and so this alternating process of ferns and blobs repeats.
Squirrels are rodents, closely related to chipmunks and slightly more distantly to dormice. The word "squirrel" originates from an ancient Greek word meaning "shadow-tailed", referring to the bushy tail of a squirrel. A family group of squirrels is known as a "drey" (also the word for a squirrel nest). A group of unrelated squirrels is known as a "scurry", though squirrels tend not to hang out in groups.
Grey squirrels were introduced to the UK from the USA in the late 19th Century and within decades they had replaced the native red squirrel in most parts of the country.
Compared to red squirrels, grey squirrels are able to eat a wider diet (including acorns), are larger so can survive colder winters, and are better able to survive in the fragmented habitats created by urbanisation. They are also thought to be carriers of a squirrel pox virus which they usually recover from but has been fatal to red squirrels, although red squirrels are now also developing some immunity.
To date, culling of grey squirrels has not reversed their domination of woodland habitat and alternative approaches such as planting food with contraceptives are being explored as a means to control the population. The theory is that infertile squirrels can compete for food against fertile squirrels, whereas culling can create a glut of food resulting in a higher number of squirrels surviving which replace those that were exterminated. Natural predators such as goshawks or pine martens also remove more grey squirrels than red squirrels. This is because red squirrels are more savvy having co-evolved with the predators so for example they recognise the scent of pine martens and actively avoid areas with this.
Squirrels assess each of their acorns before burying them. If an acorn is too light (which suggests it might have a hole), the squirrel will eat it immediately rather than risking it going mouldy.
In order to later find the nuts that they've buried, squirrels need to be organised. Some species of squirrel have been studied and found to structure their hoards by type of nut e.g. burying all their acorns under one tree and all their conkers under another. This is equivalent to us organising all the veg onto one shelf of the fridge to make it easier to remember where to look for them.
As well as forgetting where they buried some of them, squirrels may also lose a quarter of their buried food to birds, other rodents and fellow squirrels. Squirrels therefore use dummy tactics to confuse thieves by sometimes just pretending to bury a nut.
Squirrels eyes are positioned on the sides of their head which allows them to spot predators approaching from behind them. When a squirrel spots a predator, its runs away in a zigzag pattern. This confuses many of their predators but unfortunately it doesn't work well for cars.
Young squirrels suffer a high mortality rate in the wild and less than one in three make it to adulthood. The ones that do, live on average for about 6 years, although a lucky one can live to about 12 years old. In captivity, where there are neither predators, cars nor cold winters to contend with, they can reach 20 years old.
By using their tail as a parachute, squirrels are able to survive falls from high trees. This allows them to attempt risky jumps between treetops that don't always work out. They are one of the few mammals that can (but not always) survive an impact at their terminal velocity i.e. if a squirrel jumped out of an aeroplane, it may well survive.
In urban areas in cold countries such as Canada, a black form of the grey squirrel is more common which is able to withstand the cold better both by retaining more heat and also having a slower metabolism. In wilderness areas where predators are more common, the black squirrels don't seem to do so well, perhaps because they are less camouflaged against trees than the grey ones.
The ferns with solid leaves are appropriately called hart's tongue as the leaf resembles the tongue of a deer. It is the only native species of fern that doesn't have divided leaves. The Latin name for the species means "centipede" as the underside of the leaves have rows of brown spore cases that form a pattern resembling centipede legs.
Hart's tongue ferns thrive in shady places and are tolerant of the lime used in mortar so are sometimes found growing in old walls. It's an evergreen so leaves can be seen all year round but there's usually a flurry of new growth in mid March when new leaves can be seen gradually unfurling over a number of days.
The 84ft tall tower on Gribbin Head was erected by Trinity House in 1832 as a daylight navigation aid for shipping, enabling ships to distinguish Gribbin Head more easily from other headlands along Cornwall’s south coast. It is now owned by the National Trust and can be climbed on some Sundays during summer; a flag is flown to show when it is open.
Kestrels are members of the falcon family and the most common bird of prey in Europe although in recent years in Britain they have been overtaken by the buzzard. They can be recognised from their fairly small size for a bird of prey, brown plumage and black tips to their tail when in flight. Despite having a wingspan of over half a metre, kestrels only weigh around 200g.
Kestrels are primarily vole specialists. If there are a shortage of voles they will feed on smaller rodents such as mice and shrews, lizards and even on insects if larger prey are not available. Particularly in urban areas where there aren't many voles they will also take birds such as sparrows and even those as large as starlings.
The size of the kestrel population is very dependent on the vole population. The mortality of young kestrels is high. Around 60-70% don't survive their first year and the main cause of this is starvation.
Kestrels are easily spotted when hovering, watching their prey. Whilst hovering, kestrels have the extraordinary ability to keep their head totally still, even in strong winds.
During winter months, kestrels mostly hunt from perches rather than by hovering as this burns too much energy at a time when food resources are scarce. The reason the birds don't do this all year round is that hovering is a much more productive way to catch prey so when temperatures are warmer and food is more abundant they switch strategies.
Over recent decades, the kestrel population has been in decline and is now about half of what it was at the start of the 1970s. The exact reasons are not known but it's strongly suspected it is connected to a decline in vole numbers perhaps due to changing farming methods. Reduced availability of nesting sites (e.g. in old trees) may also be a contributing factor.
Blackthorn is a spiny type of plum which is more broadly a member of the rose family. It is native to the UK and common on old farmland where blackthorn trees were planted as hedges to keep out cattle. It is still common in Cornish hedgerows today and also common on the coast as it's tolerant to salt.
Given the right conditions, a blackthorn tree can live 100 years and grow to about 20ft in height. In harsher environments such as by the coast the bushes may be as little as 2ft tall.
The name "blackthorn" is just a general reference to the dark colour of the bark, rather than anything specific to do with the thorns which are not any darker than the rest of the wood. It's primarily a comparison with hawthorn where the bark is lighter (in fact hawthorn is also known as "white thorn" despite not having white thorns). Just to confuse things further, the flowers of blackthorn are whiter than hawthorn!
In mediaeval times, blackthorn was associated with evil. This may also tie in with the English word "strife" which has Celtic origins. Straif was the name of a letter used in Celtic Ogham script and was originally the word for "sulphur". Some of the other letters in the script corresponded to tree names. In late mediaeval times, a retrospective assignment of trees to the letters in the alphabet used for Ogham that weren't already tree names became popular (sometimes known as the "tree alphabet") and blackthorn was chosen for Straif.
The expression "Blackthorn Winter" is a rural expression for a final cold snap in late March or early April when the blackthorn is in flower. It was generally used in the context of not getting too carried away (e.g. planting crops) if there was a warm week in early March as more frosts may still be yet to come.
Blackthorn wood is very tough and hard-wearing. In order to form its thorns, the tree allows the tips of the tiny stems that make up the thorns to die. The dead wood in the thorn tip is harder and therefore sharper than the living wood.
Blackthorn stems are often covered in fungi or bacteria and if a thorn punctures skin, these can sometimes cause infection. Any splinters left in the skin can also disintegrate over time and result in an immune response. If a puncture wound becomes infected, it's a good idea to get it checked-out in a minor injuries unit in case antibacterial or anti-fungal treatment is needed to prevent it escalating.
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.
A cordial can be made from blackthorn blossom by dissolving 100g of sugar in 1 litre of warm water mixing one large handful of blossom, scaled up to produce the quantity you require.
The Lugger was a type of sailing boat widely used for fishing until the 20th Century, and was the principal vessel of the Cornish fishing industry. The type of sails it used were known as "lugsails", and were positioned asymmetrically with respect to the mast so more of the sail was behind than in front of the mast. The origin of the name is uncertain, but one suggestion is that it might be from "ear-shaped-sail", which a French name for the class of boats ("aurique") also points to.
In the early 20th Century, small petrol-paraffin engines became available which allowed the boats to enter a harbour more easily. At this point, the boats also began to last longer because oil spills from the engine soaked into the timber, both preventing rot and also killing off woodworm and woodlice that, formerly, had gradually devoured wooden vessels. Some of the vessels from this period have survived, converted to pleasure craft.
Whilst there's a bit of a joke that Cornish Time is "d'reckly", the reason why things happen a bit later in Cornwall can be explained by a brief introduction to marine navigation (possibly in more ways than one by a local who is not amused!):
Longitude is the east-west position around the globe in degrees (0-360). Greenwich in London was chosen to be 0 degrees, known as the "meridian". The sun rises in the east so places east of the meridian get the sun earlier and places west get the sun later.
Each global 1-hour timezone covers 15 degrees of longitude (360 degrees divided by 24 hours). Being the most westerly part of the UK mainland, Cornwall is roughly 5 degrees or a third of a timezone away from London - about 20 minutes behind GMT. Since clocks are not set differently, everything involving the sun - dawn, dusk etc - happens at a later time.
The take home message is that it's therefore possible to enjoy a couple of glasses of wine watching the sun set over the sea whilst the capital is in darkness.
The salt-laden breeze coming off the sea dries out leaf buds and inhibits growth so the plants end up growing most vigorously in the lee of the wind. In the direction facing the prevailing wind, the growth is therefore more compact and stunted whereas in the lee of the wind, the branches are much more straggly. The result is that the trees appear to point away from the prevailing wind. Where there are no obstacles interfering with the wind direction, the shape of the trees can be used as a compass. Prevailing winds come from the southwest, so in general, trees in Cornwall point northeast.
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