"This is our heritage, this is what we want to keep similar for anybody to walk, farm or ride across. The Clee Hill Common is there for everyone."
Roddy Yapp, Clee Hill Commoners' Association
The Clee Hills dominate this area of south Shropshire, creating a unique landscape more hardy and unyielding than that below. Yet look closely and it becomes obvious how much even this landscape has been shaped by those who lived here once. The first quarries opened on Titterstone Clee in 1881 and, within a generation, hundreds worked them, biting out basalt and coal in hungry chunks from the summit-tops. Today only a handful of workers remain. Peregrine falcons have taken their place, nesting on the deserted quarry walls.
There are miles of common land here too, a fragment of the vast span that once existed across the country. There are families, too, who still turn out their sheep onto the common, a way of life that can be traced back to medieval times. Doing so has helped make the commons rich in wildlife, including orchids and other rare flowers, but many of the commoners now worry they may be the last generation to farm this way. Shropshire Wildlife Trust recently bought a large part of Catherton Common, in the heart of the Clee Hills, and is working with its commoners to restore this landscape for both wildlife and people.
Visit Shropshire Wildlife Trust reserves in the Clee Hills
