Wild Cornwall

Cornwall has many varied habitats, but from the Cornish heathland to the Cornish hedge they have all been shaped by people. Atlantic woodlands on the South West coast, are among the least disturbed of our semi-natural habitats.  They contain hardwoods: oaks, willow, ash, hazel, with some birch and rowan, all pruned by the ocean wind, dwarfed by the rocky, salty soil, and clothed in ferns, mosses and lichens by clean, warm, moist air.

Granite makes fist from hedges  Bracken as brittle as a weasels'laugh

Lean-to hawthorn, Fern in constant curtsey,  Lichen gloves rock

Heart-stopping, delicious melancholy

Where the land meets the sea,  Moss explodes on the rocks.

23/04/01       Link to the building of Wild Cornwall        23/04/01