Pudsham Meadow through the Seasons – A Wild Writing year

‘The bird that calls from the willow, lovely is its little beak with its clear call’
9th century Irish

I wanted to hear the willow-warbler, the slide of its song, the lilt and the lift. A tiny bird that every Spring flies from the African continent over the deserts and half way round the world to return to northern Europe and a certain willow tree in Pudsham Meadows. The little bird with the olive wings and yellow eye-band. That early April morning, when I first came here, I couldn’t see much life at all. But I knew it was there. Pudsham meadows stand on one of the highest points in Southern England. All I could spy were tiny green shoots poking up out of winter’s leaves and the gold torcs of the sedge, then a swallow flew over the meadow as the sun rose.

There’s treasure trove in these meadows. I watched it rise up like the Sutton Hoo hoard, the yellow Rattle, the Southern Marsh Orchid, the charming little Lousewort and all their moths and butterflies. Most recently I discovered the meadows’ hidden night life; the huge, tropical green and pink Elephant Hawk-moth that flies to the sweet scented nectaries of the long-lipped Butterfly orchids, the undulating Peach Blossom moth like a rippling rose kimono. I found the mysterious purple Heath Spotted Orchid and its secret language written in cryptic markings on pale petals – landing lights for pollinating flies and hoverflies. My imagination was ignited.

The most thrilling places to nature write are the most species rich. I believe there is a synergy between a wild, healthy ecosystem and the freedom and release of the creative imagination. Because in the fabric of the whole nature reveals herself more fully. I wrote through the Spring, Summer and into Autumn. Last October I wrote through a storm. Rain-clouds blew up over Widecombe, sleet and hail sluiced the meadow, ricocheted off the ground baked hard by the long summer drought, winnowed summer’s growth and brought the landscape of wintertime.

Over the year of writing here I’ve learnt about interrelationship; the story of plant and insect, the Devil’s Bit Scabious plant and the Marsh Fritillary butterfly, the Greater Butterfly Orchid and the Elephant Hawkmoth. An ancient meadow is a network of intricate relationship. But there’s another connectedness too. Between humans and the living world.

I found stories here in nature, through the seasons, and back through time. I found them in the hedgebanks, links to the past and former ways of thinking, in those who scythed these meads in days gone by. I found them in folk names of the meadow flora, in their myths and legends, in ancient lore related to the gathering of herbs and herbalism. In the lives of Dartmoor ponies brought to graze here in November. I discovered that hay meadows are associated not only with a floral heritage but with rural heritage too and these two are interdependent.

These threatened habitats and the endangered species they give refuge too, (97% of meadows have vanished in my grandparents’ lifetime) were once highly valued by earlier peoples. Shelter for herds and flocks, hay meadows provided essential winter fodder for hard working plough beasts, oxen and later horse. Meadow craft – scything, hedge building, drystone walling, transhumance,* man and nature interlinked, favoured the growth of meadow herbs and flowers in wall and sward and all the wildlife they underpin.

When you write in a meadow a soldier beetle, a dragonfly may light on your page attracted to the brightness and warmth. As I wrote, figures from the past wandered out of the meadows and into my notebook: women gathering herbs and berries for seasonal feasts and celebrations, herding cattle off the moor at the summer’s end to shelter in the meadow folds, singing the old croons that were remembered in our great grandparents’ day. Pudsham opens like a book. The story unfolds as you turn each page.

The meadows are entering a new phase of creativity too. A pond will be dug here to encourage the Marsh Fritillary Butterfly to the Devil’s Bit Scabious. The hedge blackthorn has been pleached to entice Black-Hairstreak butterflies to new stems where the female lays her little, white, stippled eggs. Dormouse boxes have been installed to encourage this charming creature’s return. There is hope for nature; green shoots are growing.

The willow-warblers have returned and are singing again. The magenta, purple and ivory orchids are coming up. Rainbow colours of day flying butterflies, of herb and flower, orange, alizarin and the smell of the meadow, all the sweet flowers and grasses are meld,ing into one on the long hazy days of a Dartmoor summer. Moths are in their swinging nightlife jiving, buzzing flower in bush and plant. A whole host of butterflies, and bees are on the wing by day.

This summer I have been asked by DPA to take a nature-writing walk at Pudsham Meadows with folklorist and author Helen Bruce. What a privilege, to hand on the joy and life I have learnt here. And to read you some of the stories I found.

* ‘transhumance’: The bringing of herds of sheep and cattle down off the high moor in the winter to shelter in meadows lower down and returning them to graze the higher moor in summertime.