There’s that old saying: “You can see our house from here.” Well you can, just about, if you look in the other direction.
This was a location I chose for some establishing shots for an Austrian programme about squirrels. There are plenty of grey squirrels in the deciduous woodlands along the banks of the Lower Wye Valley. The high point in the distance is the well-known Wyndcliffe viewpoint.
These woodlands are rich in tree and other plant species. The banks are steep and inaccessible in many places, rendering parts of these woodlands out of bounds for the majority of people. Looking back through historical records you will find references to red squirrel and even pine marten in this area. That would be something special on my wildlife cameraman tick list – red squirrel and pine marten within a few miles of home. A pine marten was filmed in Shropshire very recently, and such is the secretive nature of this mammal that they could be living nearby without us having a clue. That could certainly be the case in woodlands like the ones we have in the Lower Wye Valley.