Wild Communities Trail - Green Woodpecker Traditional Cache

The Wild Communities Trail will take you around the wild places of Ystradgynlais including 3 nature reserves managed by Brecknock Wildlife Trust and 2 parks owned by the Ystradgynlais Town Council. The total length of the trail is six miles but it can be broken down into sections. The trail is child friendly although some short sections are muddy. Information cards about an aspect of the wildlife found in this area are in most of the containers.

The Ystradgynlais area has, perhaps surprisingly, very good habitats for wildlife and a number of rare species of plants, insects, reptiles etc can be seen if you are quiet.  100 years ago this area was the hotbed of the Industrial Revolution with coal mines scarring the countryside and iron works belching out smoke and steam. How quickly nature has reclaimed the land!

Wern Plemys

The reserve is managed by Brecknock Wildlife Trust and consists of three wildflower meadows and a large area of woodland. The reserve lies on the site of a former coal-mine and is a wonderful example of how nature can reclaim an area. Just below the main meadow are the crumbling walls of an old farmhouse. The farmer would have used the meadow for grazing his animals. The Trust continues this traditional form of management by grazing the meadows with Exmoor ponies.

Excellent views of the meadows, woodland and Ystradgynlais can be seen from the disused railway line running along the eastern boundary of the reserve. The line can be accessed from the upper right-hand corner of the main meadow.

The meadows feature a range of uncommon plants such as ragged robin, great burnet and devil's bit scabious. The damper parts provide excellent habitat for frogs.

The woodland contains trees such as oak, ash, hawthorn and alder and provides home to a range of woodland birdbirds. If you are lucky, you may see a green woodpecker with its green and yellow colouring, red head and undulating flight.

  Please do not climb on the walls or move any stones. Not in the wall.

Please leave the information cards in the containers when you have signed the log and replace carefully as you found it. If you are heading to WCT-Cuckoo next, a drier but less direct route is to return to Diamond Park and follow the wood edge to your left and uphill until you reach another path over a wooden bridge. Follow that path up the hill until you reach the cycle track then turn left.

Well done to WELSHMAN65 on being First to Find.

Placed with kind permission from Wild Communities Project, Brecknock Wildlife Trust