As the river approaches Hay-on-Wye it takes on the characteristics of a mature lowland river, meandering across a broad, damp valley below the northern scarp of the Black Mountains. The floodplain betrays plenty of evidence of the shifting course of the river, with abandoned river channels and several oxbow lakes, especially to the west of Glasbury. The effects of glaciation are plainly visible between Hay-on-Wye and Clyro, where the river has cut a narrow channel through an impressive moraine where glacial deposits are heaped up to a height of 50m (165ft).
This impression of maturity follows the Wye on its journey through Herefordshire as a tree-lined river centred in a broad floodplain flanked by low, rolling hills. There are far-reaching views across quintessential English farmland, with the underlying Old Red Sandstone giving a characteristic rich red colour to the soils. Rock exposures are rare, but occasionally the meandering river has carved out low cliffs – for example at Brobury Scar and at Bridstow near Ross-on-Wye. Below Hereford the meanders become more pronounced, isolating the low-lying King’s Caple and Foy peninsulas.
Looking across the Wye Valley to Banc-y-Celyn from the northern scarp of Aberedw Rocks (Walk 20)
To the west of the river the land gradually rises to the brownstone scarp, with astonishing views westward to the Black Mountains from the summit of Aconbury Hill and extensive woodlands on ancient sites such as Athelstan’s Wood. To the east the uplifted older rocks of the Woolhope Dome form an area of complex geology and spectacular landscape, with hidden valleys and narrow parallel ridges. An intricate blend of orchards, pastures and semi-natural woodland typifies the area, with the nature reserves of Common Hill and Lea and Paget’s Wood providing particular highlights.
South of Ross-on-Wye the river continues sluggishly at first between lush river meadows before suddenly entering a narrow, twisting gorge between high river cliffs. The rim of the plateau above the gorge consists in several places of puddingstone – a hard quartz conglomerate (previously much in demand for millstones) – which outcrops on Coppet Hill near Goodrich and, spectacularly, at the Buckstone and Near Hearkening Rock, where the breakaway boulder known as the Suck Stone – the largest detached boulder in Britain – lies where it fell just below the ridge.
From Monmouth to the river’s mouth south of Chepstow the Wye is confined in a narrow valley below steep wooded slopes punctuated by limestone cliffs. On either side of the river is an extensive plateau – around Trellech to the west and the Forest of Dean to the east – with woodlands and heathland. The extent to which the river has cut down through the plateau is shown by the abandoned meanders at Newland (where the misfit valley is now more than 100m/330ft above the level of the Wye) and St Briavels.
The massive bulk of the detached boulder known as the Suck Stone (Walk 6)
Plants and wildlife
In very broad terms, the Wye Valley can be divided into three ecological zones: the valley grasslands, with riverside meadows and enclosed fields; the steeper slopes on the valley sides, with hanging woods and encroaching bracken; and the moorlands above, with gorse, bilberry and occasional heather among rough grasses.
The great moorland plateau of Elenydd is characteristic of the uplands flanking the upper Wye. Aptly characterised as a vast, pale sheepwalk, it consists mostly of rank grasses with a little heather, and cotton grass and purple moor grass in the wetter areas. The mountain grazings traditionally supported the ‘hafod and hendre’ system of transhumance where the hafod – or shepherd’s cottage – was only inhabited in summer.
In and around the river itself there is a gradual transition from mosses, lichens and liverworts higher up (especially in the gorge above Rhayader) to extensive beds of ranunculus (water-crowfoot) in the more mature, lowland river, with particularly luxuriant beds around Boughrood and near Monmouth, while below Builth Wells wild chives dominate the banks for several miles.
In Herefordshire the Wye and Lugg have yellow water lily, water aven and great pond sedge, but the greatest interest lies in the few remaining Lammas Meadows, managed under a medieval system where stock were excluded until after the hay cut in July. Most were enclosed by 1900, but Lugg meadows and Hampton Bishop meadows still survive.
The woodlands of the Wye Valley are world-renowned, from the oak, alder and willow along the infant river to the amazing hanging woods of the lower gorge. The Woolhope Dome and Wye Gorge retain wild service trees and small-leaved and large-leaved limes – species that dominated the woods here five millennia ago – and at Coppet Hill two precious fragments of medieval woodland have survived. The gorge woodlands are of exceptional ecological interest, with limes and rare whitebeams and a ground plantlife that includes herb paris, yellow archangel and dog’s mercury.
Clockwise (from top-left): The distinctive marsh cinquefoil at Cors y Llyn (Walk 23); Ragged robin at Cors y Llyn (Walk 23); Bee orchid at White Rocks Nature Reserve (Walk 7); Heath spotted-orchid at Cors y Llyn (Walk 23)
Wildflowers come into their own below Builth Wells, with meadow saxifrage and cowslips common, while bluebells, anemones and ramsons colour the woodland floors in spring and 27 species of orchid grace the lower Wye, with bird’s nest and butterfly orchids in the gorge woodlands and pyramid and bee orchids thinly but widely distributed. Semi-natural grassland still clings on in the lower valley and is best seen on the Seven Sisters rocks above Monmouth, which host a remarkable assemblage of rare plants such as bloody crane’s-bill and lesser calamint.
Heathland has all but been eliminated through a mixture of agricultural intensification and afforestation, but a few fragments remain – notably at Poor’s Allotment north of Chepstow. Heathland restoration projects using Exmoor ponies to control scrub encroachment are gradually improving the situation at several other sites above the gorge.
Fish are scarce in the headwaters of the Wye, with only the most resolute of the Atlantic salmon for which the river has been renowned for centuries reaching the shallow pebble beds around Llangurig, where the hardiest salmon overwinter and breed. Edward II ensured that his Scottish campaign in 1308 was provisioned with Wye salmon, but over-fishing and disease has taken its toll.
Trout, bullhead and lampreys join the salmon as the river flows past the confluence with the Afon Marteg above Rhayader, and there is an increase in coarse fish such as roach and dace from Newbridge downstream, but the twaite shad is the Wye’s second most important fish. Like the salmon, this ancient native fish migrates from the sea to breed, its most favoured spawning grounds being the big, sluggish meanders below Hereford.
Few mammals roam the uplands of Mid Wales bordering the Wye: beavers were extinct by the 12th century, red deer were hunted to extinction in medieval times and (allegedly) the last wolf in southern Britain was killed in the Edw Valley near Builth Wells in the 16th century. Even the goats have gone – they grazed too destructively and there is now a sheep monoculture on the high hills.
So the higher reaches of the valley now see only stoats and weasels, with foxes lower down and dormice in the deciduous woodlands. Polecats, largely confined to Mid Wales by the 1950s, are now widespread. Brown hares are present but quite scarce around the Herefordshire Wye, while water voles are declining through the loss of bankside habitats and predation by mink. Grey squirrels finally ousted the reds from the Woolhope Dome in the 1960s, while a few fallow deer roam the woodlands above the lower Wye.
The big success story, however, is the otter, which was in