Caerwood and Ashberry Goose House

Caerwood And Ashberry Goose House
Site of Special Scientific Interest
Example - Lesser Horseshoe Bat (Rhinolophus hipposideros)
Location within Gloucestershire
Area of Search	Gloucestershire
Grid reference	ST54719655 & ST54649657
Coordinates	51°39′57″N 2°39′22″W / 51.665937°N 2.656165°W / 51.665937; -2.656165Coordinates: 51°39′57″N 2°39′22″W / 51.665937°N 2.656165°W / 51.665937; -2.656165
Interest	Biological
Area	0.01 hectare
Notification	1991
Natural England website

Caerwood And Ashberry Goose House (ST54719655 ST54649657) is a 0.01-hectare (0.025-acre) biological Site of Special Scientific Interest in Gloucestershire, notified in 1991. The site was previously notified as Caerwood, Tidenham and lies within the Wye Valley Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty.^[1]^[2]

Location and habitat

The site is notified for its nationally important breeding roosts of Lesser horseshoe bats (one of three sites in Gloucestershire). It lies at the top of the wooded gorge slopes of the Wye Valley, and at the southernmost tip of the Forest of Dean.^[1]

The site comprises one of a series of Sites of Special Scientific Interest within the Forest of Dean and Wye Valley (Gloucestershire and Monmouthshire). These sites support (between them) breeding and hibernation roosts for Lesser and Greater horseshoe bats. This is of European importance. Other sites in the group in Gloucestershire (all of which are SSSIs) include the breeding sites of Blaisdon Hall, Dean Hall Coach House & Cellar and Sylvan House Barn. Hibernation sites include Buckshraft Mine & Bradley Hill Railway Tunnel, Devil's Chapel Scowles, Old Bow And Old Ham Mines, Westbury Brook Ironstone Mine, and Wigpool Ironstone Mine.^[1]

The deciduous woodlands and sheltered valleys of the Forest of Dean and the Wye Valley provide a good feeding area, and the underground systems provide roosting and breeding sites. A ring of iron-ore bearing Carboniferous Limestone in the Forest of Dean has created a series of ancient and more recent mines which provide hibernation sites. The citations for the series of sites provide common information.

Wye Valley and Forest of Dean Bat Sites/ Safleoedd Ystlumod Dyffryn Gwy a Fforest y Ddena are recognised as a Special Area of Conservation (SAC) under the EU Habitats Directive.^[3]^[4]

Building space

The site comprises the roof spaces of two buildings which are used seasonally as lesser horseshoe bat nursery roosts. There are indications that the site may have been used for over fifty years. The site is also used as a nursery roost by Pipistrelle bats (Pipistrellus pipistrellus).^[1]

References

SSSI Source

External links

	Lesser horseshoe bat recorded on a heterodyne bat detector set to 107 KHz
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Natural England (SSSI information)

Biological Sites of Special Scientific Interest in Gloucestershire
Summarised data for all sites (biological and geological)
Ashleworth Ham Astridge Wood Badgeworth Barnsley Warren Barton Bushes Bigsweir Woods Blaisdon Hall Bourton Down Box Farm Meadows Boxwell Brassey Brooks Head Grove Buckshraft Mine & Bradley Railway Tunnel Bull Cross, The Frith and Juniper Hill Bushley Muzzard, Brimpsfield Caerwood and Ashberry Goose House Chaceley Meadow Clarke's Pool Meadow Cleeve Common Cockleford Marsh Collinpark Wood Coombe Hill Canal Coombe Hill Cotswold Commons and Beechwoods Cotswold Water Park Crickley Hill and Barrow Wake Daneway Banks Dean Hall Coach House & Cellar Devil's Chapel Scowles Dingle Wood Dixton Wood Dymock Woods Edge Common Elmlea Meadows Frampton Pools Highbury Wood Hobbs Quarry Hornsleasow Roughs Hucclecote Meadows Innsworth Meadow Juniper Hill, Edgeworth Kempley Daffodil Meadow Kingscote and Horsley Woods Lark Wood Leckhampton Hill and Charlton Kings Common Lineover Wood Lower Woods Lower Wye Gorge May Hill Midger Minchinhampton Common Nagshead Old Bow and Old Ham Mines Old River Severn, Upper Lode Pennsylvania Fields, Sedbury Poor's Allotment Puckham Woods Range Farm Fields River Wye Rodborough Common Rough Bank, Miserden Salmonsbury Meadows Selsley Common Severn Estuary Severn Ham, Tewkesbury Shorn Cliff and Caswell Woods Slade Brook Soudley Ponds Speech House Oaks Stenders Quarry Stinchcombe Hill Strawberry Banks Swanpool Wood and Furnace Grove Swift's Hill Sylvan House Barn The Hudnalls The Malvern Hills Tudor Farm Bank Turvey's Piece Upper Severn Estuary Upham Meadow and Summer Leasow Upper Wye Gorge Walmore Common Westbury Brook Ironstone Mine Whelford Meadow Wigpool Ironstone Mine Wildmoorway Meadows Winson Meadows Woodchester Park Workman's Wood Wotton Hill Yarley Meadows
Neighbouring areas Avon Hereford and Worcester Oxfordshire Wiltshire

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