Buckinghamshire: Aylesbury Centre and Dinton/Ford Meadows

26 April 2011   
Length: Half day
 

(1) Aylesbury Museum                                OS SP8113

This visit was to view Aylesbury Prune, which also features in some of our longer walks at later dates.  Here, appropriately, it appears in the centre of Aylesbury itself.

We took a train to Aylesbury and walked up to the County Museum through the shopping centre.  The collections are interesting, of course, but this visit concentrated on the small garden area accessible through the café.  The garden includes a number of old pear cultivars.  On the left hand (north) side is an enclosed area behind an open wooden gate, with what remains of the Titley Memorial Fountain and a specimen of the Aylesbury Prune, a damson-like plum cultivar Prunus domesticus cv. which was the staple of the old orchards in this area.  By this time the flowers were over and small green fruit were just forming.  A visit in early April (flowers) or towards autumn (mature fruit) would be more rewarding.  

See www.buckscc.gov.uk/bcc/museum/garden.page.

The Aylesbury Prune tree at the Museum

Young fruit

Old pear tree: characteristic bark

(2) Fraucup Meadow, Ford nr Dinton  OS SP7708

The meadows around the lane from Ford to the Mushroom Farm and Aston Mullins were once famous for their prolific fritillaries Fritillaria meleagra, which occurred in thousands and were the occasion for annual celebration and picking (on 1^st May).  The local name for the fritillary was “fraucup” or “frogcup”, which may be a corruption of “Ford-cup”.  Few now remain (a fairly high percentage of them the white form) and they flower much earlier than formerly (early April).

We caught the Oxford bus from Aylesbury Town Centre to the Dinton bus-stop.  We followed footpaths to the village of Ford, and then walked around footpaths to look for fritillaries.  We were able to find a number in fruit.  They can occur along the side of the lane just before the Mushroom Farm (including under the planted poplars on the left) and may be glimpsed over the gate in Fraucup Meadow itself, the last pasture on the left coming from Ford SP772085 to the farm.  Other sites are more difficult of access, but a few occur in the field by the footpath paralleling the lane to the west at SP768088.  A good number (perhaps more recently planted) still occur with cowslips Primula veris at SP768095, but there is no public access.  We followed a footpath further west (leading to Aston Sandford Manor), past an interesting remnant of an old moated medieval manor which still has water in the moat.  A little whitlow-grass Erophila verna grows on bare earth on the bank. 

The fame of the fraucup is celebrated in a stained-glass window in Dinton Church, SP767110.  The churchyard has many cowslips and the bank to the south outside the wall contains much mouse-ear hawkweed Pilosella officinarum, hoary plantain Plantago media, whitlow-grass and bulbous buttercup Ranunculus bulbosus.  There are remains of old stocks here.  The lane beside the church leading to the main A418 has old horse-chestnuts Aesculus hippocastanum on each side, including a red horse-chestnut A. carnea, in full flower on this occasion.  Early April is, however, recommended for a chance of finding fritillaries in flower. 

          The local Wildlife Trust and other bodies have been approached about conservation of Fraucup Meadow, but they considered that it had already become too neglected.  The population of fritillaries is nowhere near its former glories, but there are still fifty or so at this site, 99% of which are purple, a ratio typical of a native population (whereas the other populations we saw contain 50% or more white forms and may be more recent plantings).  (We are grateful for help and information from local resident Roger Kemp, who has taken a special interest in this flower.)

Fritillary

Moat of former medieval manor