Wildlife and grounds

When Colin, Carrie & Alexander moved into the Mill in late 2006, the grounds were completely overgrown. Work is still very much in progress but we have created a small nature trail through the grounds, to make the most of the wonderful natural wildlife in the garden.

Guests are free to walk through the grounds and take a bottle of wine from the cellar to enjoy in a secluded corner or grassy bank by the millpond. No chemicals or pesticides are used on the grounds; we have the most natural slug pellets available…ducks! Several deer have been spotted in the Badgers' Copse and a pair of red legged partridges have made their home in the orchard.

The trail passes through the new-planted apple orchard and down to the Old Reservoir Dell.This area has been created to provide a protected habitat for small animals and insects. In the summer months, it is home to finches, tree creepers and woodpeckers.

The wildlife pond in the Dell, which is adorned with marsh marigold and water mint, is alive with damsel flies dancing over the water lilies, pond skaters and beetles are aplenty, and the tree fern, log piles, and rough grasses provide welcome shelter for the field mice, frogs, voles and shrew.

The trail then leads over the stream and around the mill pond, where the wild ducks and moorhens keep themselves busy. Over the lower millpond, the buzzard keeps a watchful eye over the tall grasses and clovers and the moorhens shepherd their trail of tiny chicks undercover of the willow tree on the tiny island. If you are lucky, you may see the heron standing in the shallows.

Buddleia, sweet marjoram, sedum and wild thyme attract many species of butterfly. In the spring, hundreds of daffodils adorn the grassy banks of the millpond.

If the stream is running, you will need to hop over the stepping stone and follow the trail up and past the ancient badgers' sett, along the banks of the mill stream to the higher millpond. Sluice gates released water from this pond and along a leat to the mill. This pond is now owned by our neighbours. The trail then leads over a little wooden bridge to the badgers' copse. We have left this part of the grounds to bramble and gorse, as there is a large badger sett, which we do not wish to be disturbed. We are in the process of installing night cameras in the copse, which we hope to be able to relay to your room, to enable guests to watch the badgers' nocturnal activities!

The trail then runs along the top of the quarry, from which slate was taken in the 1700's to build the mill, from here there are splendid views over the grounds and over the fields to Fowey. Here we have planted bluebell, wood anemone, primroses and snowdrops in the dappled shade of the hawthorn .There is a very steep drop of about 20ft from the top of the quarry, and so we ask that guests please take great care. A wooden style and a narrow path bring you back down to the lower mill pond. This is fed by natural springs and often dries up in the warmer summer months, but is a torrent of tumbling waterfalls throughout the autumn and winter.

Sitting in the pergola, late evening, is the best spot to watch the bats, with their radar-guided acrobatics, soaring and diving over the old wheel-pit and the meadow. If you sit very still, the barn owl may grace you with her presence, gliding over the field-poppy and daisies, hovering, dropping, hunting…. sometimes completely oblivious us.