Grid Ref: SO 875085 | Area: 24 Hectares | Volunteer Here
Frith Wood Nature Reserve, also known as Morley Penistan Nature Reserve, is a wonderful beech wood straddling the Painswick and Slad valleys.
It is an example of a wood that has been managed for timber as well being of high conservation value. The high quality beech in the wood today is thought to have derived from seed planted after the Napoleonic Wars possibly from Belgium.
The wood is now managed as high forest and an array of woodland plants can be seen, including uncommon species such as White helleborine Cephalanthera damasonium and Columbine Aquilegia vulgaris, and the more familiar woodruff Galium odoratum.
A rustling in the undergrowth gives away the presence of a wood mouse, or perhaps yellow-necked mouse, as it scurries around amongst the carpet of bluebells Hyacinthoides non-scriptus.
The wood is also home to the nationally scare Ena montana, a Bulin snail whose strongholds are now in the ancient woodlands of the Cotswolds. Roe deer are commonly seen by visitors to the wood.
Also found within the wood, on the Painswick side of the ridge are the foundations of a building known as Pan’s Lodge, named after the Greek god of the same name. The building dates back to at least 1757 at a time when Frith Wood was known as Coldbourn Grove. The exact history of the lodge is unclear but it seems to have been built for Benjamin Hyett, a former owner of the wood. A timbered seat now marks the spot of the caretaker’s cottage at the back of the lodge.
How to get to Frith Wood
The reserve lies three miles from Stroud on the B4070.
Go through Slad Village until the wood on your left merges with the road and you come to Bulls Cross Common and crossroads.
Park in the long lay-by on your right. Cross over and walk back to the reserve gate entrance.
Frith Wood (Morley Penistan Memorial) Nature Reserve Leaflet
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