Bloxworth Heath is a four-square-mile area of

heathland A heath () is a shrubland habitat found mainly on free-draining infertile, acidic soils and characterised by open, low-growing woody vegetation. Moorland is generally related to high-ground heaths with—especially in Great Britain—a cooler ...

north of the town of Wareham in the county of

Dorset Dorset ( ; archaically: Dorsetshire , ) is a county in South West England on the English Channel coast. The ceremonial county comprises the unitary authority areas of Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole and Dorset (unitary authority), Dors ...

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...

. It is part of

Wareham Forest Wareham Forest is an area of countryside in Dorset, England, consisting of open heathland, including Decoy Heath and Gore Heath, and plantations of conifers such as Morden Heath and Bloxworth Heath. The site is managed by Forestry England for co ...

.''Bloxworth Heath, Dorset''
at www.wildlifetrusts.org. Retrieved 5 Nov 2016.

Location

Bloxworth Heath lies about 6 kilometres southeast of the town of

Bere Regis Bere Regis () is a village and civil parish in Dorset, England, situated north-west of Wareham. In the 2011 census the civil parish had a population of 1,745. The village has one shop, a family-owned cheese barn, a post office, and two pubs ...

in Dorset and around 7 kilometres northwest of Wareham. It forms a low forested plateau between the rivers Sherford to the northeast and Piddle to the southwest. It is situated on either side of the minor road from Bere Regis to Wareham and south of the A35. To the west are Bere Heath and Philliols Heath, to the southwest is the Piddle valley, to the south is the Lower Hyde Heath, to the east is Morden Heath, to the northeast is Black Heath and to the north, on the far side of the A35, is Bere Wood and the village of

Bloxworth Bloxworth is a village and civil parish in the English county of Dorset, within Wareham Forest on the A35 road west of Poole. In the 2011 census the civil parish had 80 households and a population of 200. Bloxworth Heath is home to Woolsbarrow ...

.OS Topographic Map, 1:25,000 series, No. OL15.

Hillfort

In the middle of Bloxworth Heath on a small knoll is the

hillfort A hillfort is a type of earthwork used as a fortified refuge or defended settlement, located to exploit a rise in elevation for defensive advantage. They are typically European and of the Bronze Age or Iron Age. Some were used in the post-Roma ...

of Woolsbarrow. This is the highest point of the heath (67 m) and offers good views over the area. There is a

trig point A triangulation station, also known as a trigonometrical point, and sometimes informally as a trig, is a fixed surveying station, used in geodetic surveying and other surveying projects in its vicinity. The nomenclature varies regionally: they a ...

at the top.

Flora and fauna

Bloxworth Heath is home to two very rare species of fauna: the ground crab spider, ''

Xysticus luctator ''Xysticus'' is a genus of ground crab spiders described by C. L. Koch in 1835, belonging to the order Araneae, family Thomisidae. The genus name is derived from the Ancient Greek root ''xyst'', meaning "scraped, scraper". Description ''Xystic ...

'', and the short-tailed blue butterfly (''Cupido argiades''), which was originally called the Bloxworth blue as this is where it was first recorded in 1885.''Short-tailed Blue''
at ukbutterflies.co.uk. Retrieved 6 Nov 2016.

Walking

Bloxworth Heath is a popular walking area and there are car parks at Sugar Hill in the centre of the area and at Stroud Bridge in the south, both on the minor road from Bere Regis to Wareham. There are numerous trails including the

Hardy Way {{Use British English, date=March 2018 The Hardy Way is a waymarked long-distance footpath in southern England in the United Kingdom. Length of the Hardy Way The route runs for 354 km or 220 miles. The route The route is named for the writ ...

and Wareham Forest Way.

References

{{Reflist

External links

''Bloxworth Heath, Dorset''
at www.wildlifetrusts.org. Retrieved 5 Nov 2016. Geography of Dorset