Natural Environment

The rural areas and open moorland may look wild and untouched, but the natural habitats of the Caradon Hill area have long been influenced by the people who’ve lived and worked here. There is evidence of settlement since the Bronze Age and farms and agriculture have long had an impact on the natural environment.

Villages and towns have built up over time, shaping the landscape along with a range of industries from early ore extraction, livestock and wool trading to the 19th-century boom that supplied tin, copper and granite to a world-wide market. The landscape includes Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONB), a National Nature Reserve at Golitha, Sites of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI), including one at South Caradon Mine that is home to unique plant species that thrive in the copper-rich spoil, and a broad range of County Wildlife Sites, alongside part of the Cornish Mining World Heritage Site (WHS).

Work in this programme area focused on conservation management, surveying sites of significance and helping people get involved in their local environment. Support from local residents, relevant landowners, land managers and the St Cleer and District Commoners Association enabled beneficial projects involving habitat management, skills-sharing, raising awareness and hands-on activities.

Key Areas of support:

Parish Wildlife Projects

Spreading the word about the wildlife that lives locally and how to help conserve habitats. Plans for how best to manage wildlife sites were developed with relevant organisations. Volunteers have helped with plant, animal and landscape projects.

Invasive Plants

Investigating sites affected by certain invasive plants that are not native to the area. Offering training in how to spot the plants and how to control and monitor them.

County Wildlife Sites

Re-surveying all 18 County Wildlife Sites, offering advice to landowners and farmers and encouraging good conservation practices.

Geology Sites

Finding out more about existing sites of geological and mineralogical importance (County Geology Sites – RIGS) and assessing potential new ones. Training up volunteers and students, raising awareness of the value of these sites and improving management and access.

Features of the Caradon Hill area

The area has a special diversity of habitats ranging from the peat bogs and granite tor stacks of the high moor, through the lower roughland grazing plains favoured by ground nesting birds and moorland livestock, to improved and dry-stone walled, off-moor pasture for dairy, lamb and beef production. There are stream cut ravines giving way to steep sided river valleys and every type of woodland you can think of from abandoned industrial scrubby areas of pioneering species such as silver birch, through to traditional broadleaf woodlands and forest plantations.

Interesting facts:

• The area uniquely contains nearly every non-marine habitat to be found in Britain
• The landscape is both living and working, providing vital resources to its communities
• The landscape should be enjoyed, but visitors should respect that it is home to people, animals and plants.