Appreciating the local

Out appreciating my local patch again, this time on the lower fringes of Mynydd Garn-wen. Following the hedgerow lined thoroughfare of Lasgarn Lane brings you to Mynydd Garn-wen with its whitewashed trig point and panoramic view of agricultural Monmouthshire to the east and the Severn estuary to the south. Whilst the trig point with its undeniably impressive vista was the destination of other local exercisers I took a route that followed a dry-stone wall northwards.

Upland boundary features are a magnet for some birds. That combination of wall, fence post, barbed wire and the occasional tree, frequently attract the likes of wheatear, stonechat,and meadow pipit. The shelter from the mountain wind that a good field boundary provides benefits the one of the few upland butterflies. Up to four green hairsteak were noted fluttering around the banks of dead bracken that grade into the tight sward of the sheep grazed acid grassland.