Dorset Wildlife Trust Project: King's Lane Orchard

 "...turn around and walk along this lane, past the pub. Follow the lane down to the thatched cottage on your right, the orchard you are looking for is the one to the left of the cottage, not the orchard on the right of the cottage. You'll not miss it".

I'd arrived in Powerstock looking for King's Lane Orchard, a remnant of the many cider orchards which once surrounded the village a century ago. This isolated village clings tightly to a steep slope, a vertiginous crossroads by the church contains a many-directional signpost of ancient construction, but the lanes radiating off from here are less well documented. I'd walked in the opposite direction to my intended destination. However, meeting a local, unpacking his car, he put me back on the correct path. Maybe I should have brought a map? 

King's Lane, thatched cottage and the orchard

 I headed past the pub and began a short descent along King's Lane, a lane just wide enough for a car, and reaching the cottage (Hillside Cottage) I could see the small gate into the orchard. Best of all the sun was shining.

Bought by Dorset Wildlife Trust in 2008, this 1 hectare orchard was opened to the public in April 2009 when schoolchildren sang a song celebrating spring and apple blossom, written by Dorset based Tim Laycock, before they headed off on a mini-beasts & treasure hunt. It was a lot quieter today. Ahead of me were the remnant apple trees of an industry which once supported both the local economy, people and wildlife, a mix of interests which ensures cider orchards hold a place in nature conservation under Biodiversity Action Plans.

Entering from the lane, the orchard gently slopes away from you, down to a small stream. The research notes I had brought with me mentioned the ground can be wet and boggy by the stream, which, even after a number of rain-free weeks, proved accurate later on in my visit. What these notes did not mention was that my arrival would be heralded by a kingfisher flying along this stream calling its thin, but penetrating, call. It was a good start.

There were possibly a dozen apple trees in the orchard, many surrounded by a fence to deter the grazing sheep who are occasionally brought here to help with the biodiversity management. As one of just two orchards owned by Dorset Wildlife Trust, the other being Broad Oak which I visited in March, these community reserves mix habitat management with general visitor use. The website suggests visitors can wander around, or pick a spot for a picnic. I did the former. 

The reserve is roughly the letter P in shape, having a larger section by the cottage, leading to a small linear area by a five-bar gate and a second entrance. Sadly the apple trees on this visit had finished their blossom, small fruitlets were forming already. Despite being on the edge of the village this is a very quiet spot. No vehicles moved along the lane while I was here, leaving the only noise to come from chiffchaff, chaffinch, robin, blackbird, long tailed tit, jackdaw, rook and greenfinch (and the kingfisher of course).

It doesn't take long to wander about the main orchard area, and soon I found myself exploring the stream. The stream isn't obvious from the entrance, but scramble under some low branches and a quite delightful hidden riparian feature is revealed. 

Looking up at the orchard from the stream

Here it is all mossy and dark, light is shaded from the ground by overhead sycamore and hazel, ferns and ivy cascading down the steep stream bank. I couldn't see any fish from the bank side, but its gravelly bed would be ideal for bullhead, stickleback or minnows. Neither were there any signs of otter, but they are present here.

As I walked along the stream edge it suddenly became boggy and climbing back into the orchard itself I found I was standing on quite spongy ground. It is quite possible that if I had noticed the presence of a large clump of yellow flag iris, I may have realised I was walking towards a wet flush trickling out at the bottom of the orchard slope. These iris were just coming into flower, and looked perfect. Just beyond these, recent habitat clearance had been completed, with the scars on the ground from the removal of brambles and nettles.

It is a lovely spot and had I brought a picnic (and rug as there are no benches) I could have stayed here longer with a flask and some sandwiches. Not having these with me, I slowly climbed back up to the lane while trying to avoid trampling the many cuckoo flower peeping through the grassland. I like the fact that Dorset Wildlife Trust have secured this orchard. All too easily it could have been left to decline or worse still, being on the edge of the village, have suffered from residential development.

Date of visit: 14th May 2026. 16:00 to 16:45 (leaving the church at 17:30)

Selective list of species: Kingfisher, long tailed tit, chaffinch, chiffchaff, robin, blackbird. Apple spp., cuckoo flower, meadow buttercup, harts tongue fern, ivy, moss spp. bramble, nettle, Sycamore, hazel, oak with blackthorn hedge, Fresh molehills.

Postscript: 1 of 2

After visiting King's Lane Orchard, and being in the village, I made a pilgrimage to see the grave of the naturalist and broadcaster Kenneth Allsop. A Yorkshireman by birth, in his later years he lived at the nearby hamlet of West Milton. Allsop fell in love with this part of West Dorset and championed protecting the area from development, including the threat of oil exploration. His grave lies apart from others of the same era in the churchyard of St Mary the Virgin, in the centre of the village. I sat on a nearby bench with a flask of tea I'd collected from the car. The sun was warm, there was birdsong everywhere, lichens colonising his headstone. Not a bad place to rest in peace, whether that is alive, or dead. 

Postscript: 2 of 2 

On May 19th 2026 I received a lovely email from a Richard Dolman. Now 88 years of age, as a farm student aged 16 in 1954 he worked at King's Farm, a mile or so along the lane so named.  Mr Dolman was actually commenting on a 2020 post of mine about Eggardon Hill. However its relevance to this post makes me want to include a link to his memories here, published in March 2013. Thank you Mr Dolman for your memories.

Mickeypops muck and cow whispering:

https://westdorsetconfidential.wordpress.com/2013/03/30/mickeypops-and-cow-whispering/

Dorset Wildlife Trust project: Powerstock Common

What are my thoughts about Powerstock Common? 

Well, it is in the middle of nowhere. Actually that is unfair, it is in the centre of the most unspoilt agricultural landscape in West Dorset. And, not that easy to find. Even the Dorset Wildlife Trust's [DWT] website describes it as 'hidden away in the West Dorset countryside'. Hidden it is down a labyrinth of narrow lanes, but once discovered I loved exploring just some of its 112 hectares (about 280 acres). This is a big reserve.

The village of Powerstock I know quite well, not least its lovely hostelry The Three Horseshoes. Dominating this small village is the church St Mary the Virgin, itself used in the television adaptation of Agatha Christie's 'A Murder is Announced' with the whole village represented as Chipping Cleghorn. Until the 1960s a railway branch line ran along the valley between Bridport and Maiden Newton. Long since disused, the bed of the railway now provides a northern boundary to the reserve, and a long flat walk.

Having explored only a small part of the nearby, albeit much hillier, Kingcombe Meadows NNR in the morning, a flat walk was most welcome to my wife and I in the afternoon. On arrival the sun had intensified and dare I say it it felt almost too warm. Brimstone and peacock butterflies were on the wing and what also looked like a single specimen of a small tortoiseshell - though it was the briefest of glimpses, certainly not the marsh fritillary which is also found here. In the warm sun many an aerial territorial battle by peacock butterflies was taking place.

 

As yet another DWT reserve I had not visited before the decision was made to follow the longer waymarked path, rather than explore more randomly. On the reserve map it showed we'd pass through Wytherston Wood, through steep-sided railway cuttings, past a bat shed, then return via the central track through the Common itself and finally skirt past Wicker Coppice. What I was also to discover was that this now hidden, wild and undisturbed reserve in West Dorset has in fact been heavily influenced by human activity. For centuries it was grazed common land where also wood and its products were collected. The railway arrived and with it removed the right of commons, opening the area up for improvement. Attempts were made to fell trees and plough up for farming; many of the ancient oaks were felled with commercial conifer strands planted. During the 1960's charcoal burning occurred. However in the least accessible areas the ancient habitat of oak and ash remained untouched, which since 1975 when the DWT took over this area, has allowed regeneration to occur, with a little help or course, such as the removal of pine species and the grazing of the woodland to remove the understory.

Once again, this, the sixth reserve I've visited, felt materially different to all the others. Well developed ant hills are an obvious sign that, the once busy railway cutting, is now a quiet area for wildlife to flourish. These cuttings especially indicated summer promise for seeing many butterfly species on the wing, steep sided grassy slopes facing due south. All around, the open wood-pasture and coppiced areas played host to birdsong, chiffchaff, blackbird, song thrush, chaffinch, blue, great and long tailed tit, robin, great spotted woodpecker, green woodpecker and wren. At one point a pair of jays were raucously vocal, though unseen. Before long a male tawny owl hooted its presumed annoyance at being mobbed by these fascinating corvids. Maybe they were trying to rob the nest? I'm not sure, but as we were the only other living things in the reserve it made for an emotional day-time encounter.

Part way through the walk we passed a bat hut where presumably the lesser horseshoe bat roosts, one a handful of other bat species found on the reserve. Further along, with primrose coming into flower everywhere, I encountered my first dark edge bee fly (Bombylius major) of the year, and then saw well over a dozen more as we walked along. The primrose also hosting various solitary and bumble bees. There was an audible hum soundscape in the air.

After about an hour of walking we came to the end of the reserve and turned south. Ahead of us lay Eggardon Hill, overseeing the landscape as it has for millennia. I found it emotional viewing this landmark from this angle. Eggardon is my joint favourite view in England (the other being at Bickerton, in the Coquet Valley area of Northumberland). For decades I've stood on that hill looking down into Powerstock Common. Today I looked back from below, and felt very small and insignificant.

Reaching a gate we turned back to the car along the gravel track which dissects the reserve. What we had not realised was that, given we were looking to avoid hills, we'd walked in the wrong direction. The outbound journey had been flat, yet for the next thirty or more minutes we walked uphill, not steep, just a steady rising slog, which in normal circumstances would have been fine, but after this morning we were feeling quite weary. It didn't spoil our visit here at all, in fact those frequent stops to recharge ourselves allowed for further immersion in this large reserve. We finally reached the car after about two hours walking. 

 The only other person we saw was a farmer on his quad bike as we made it back to the car-park. Whoever says southern England is overpopulated needs to one day visit West Dorset. But, maybe I should not mention this to anyone? 

 

 

Date of Visit : Wednesday 18th March 2026 - 13.45-15.45 hrs.

Selective species seen: Oak ash wood pasture with blackthorn, old mans beard and hazel understory. Peacock, Brimstone, small tortoiseshell? dark edge bee fly, red tailed bumblebee, solitary bee spp. Primrose, lesser celandine, rough grassland.  Carrion crow, jay, jackdaw, herring gull, raven, chiffchaff, blackbird, song thrush, chaffinch, blue tit, great tit, longtailed tit, robin, great spotted woodpecker, green woodpecker and wren.