Fritillaries on Bridge Field at Clattinger Farm

We drove to Lechlade this morning to meet a contact of Helena who was selling us two display stands she no longer wanted. The reason for meeting in a car park near the bridge over the River Thames was that she was towing her caravan from Devizes to Chipping Norton and the meeting point was half way.

Having completed the exchange we crossed back from Wiltshire over the bridge into Gloucestershire, drove back through Fairford and through an area called the Cotswold Water Park. This is an extensive stretch of former gravel pits which have become lakes and are now mostly leisure activity zones or nature reserves. The geological formations which produced the deep sand and gravel beds very close tom the surface were products of the relatively recent Ice Ages. The various streams which cross the area feed into the various headwaters of the River Thames.

Last year a client told me about a nature reserve just outside the south-western boundary of the Cotswold Water Park near Somerford Keynes. Lower Moor Farm Nature Reserve is run by the rather wonderful Wiltshire Wildlife Trust having purchased the extensive farmland in 1996 including Clattinger Farm. They chose this land because it had always been farmed traditionally and with no use of artificial fertilisers. The meadows in particular were renowned for the abundance of the fritillary plant. The site became an SSSI (Site of Special Scientific Interest) and remains so to this day.

I did some research recently, as I wanted to find the fritillary fields I’d been told about, so Helena allowed me to wander about looking for access points to the specific field. I’d heard about. In the end my use of online maps and information sheets about the Nature Reserve lead me to park close to a small bridge over the Swill Brook. We clambered over the field gate, which had a welcome sign on it, and walked into the meadow. It was a joy to behold as the flowers were already profuse and possibly close to the end of their early spring flowering period. I’m so glad we went and found it as now we can return there whenever we like. There are other relatively local meadows with fritillaries close to the ancient Saxon town of Cricklade, but whenever I’ve been there hordes of other people had the same idea. This field had only two other people in it and they were hundreds of yards away from us. 

On the way out I managed to find some other fritillaries in a hedgerow on and old former woodbank, and I was able to get down low enough to see parts of the inside of the flowers. I would have blipped a shot like that, but I think fellow blippers will enjoy seeing the extent of the field today.