bewilderbrain

Soft autumn colours, tranquil reflections and comical birds in a gentle leaf-dusted ramble…

Tuesday 14th October 2025
Walk start time: 1.31pm
Walk finish time: 2.33pm
Walk area: Forest Farm and Glamorganshire canal nature reserve
Miles walked: 2.1

Is there anything more tranquil than the gentle plop of a duck into the still waters of a canal? Today’s walk was an hour sneaked from a busy day, into the blissful escape from the nearby Cardiff hustle of Forest Farm canal-side.

Forest Farm is a magnificent nature reserve, sporting miles of woodland walking, bird hides and an incredible abundance of wildlife, disused railway pathways and some of the last remaining sections of the 1790 Glamorganshire canal.

The features of old industry here only enhance the experience of nature now. (see also Forest life from the coal dust – about nature reclaiming a mountain from the spoils of coal mining)

The habitat range for wildlife at Forest Farm is enormous, ranging through woodland, ponds, meadows, scrub and marshland, and the location is a huge draw to birders and wildlife spotters due to the diverse ranges these landscapes attract.

I only have an hour, and Forest Farm is a nature location with a lot of bang for its buck. I need a dose of trees and woodland, and adding a healthy splash of canal is sure to increase the potency of my therapy.

A twisting forest path, fallen trees and autumn colours…

I start from the car park behind the huge Asda store at Coryton, getting the noise and bustle behind me as quickly as possible, and crossing the old railway bridge that leads to myriad entrances into the country park.

From here you can descend to a lovely old railway path, a gully gloriously flanked by mature beech and oak and countless other species, or you can choose several directions heading into woodland, across towards the river taff and Taff trail and the magnificent weir, or descend straight down to the beautiful Glamorganshire canal side.

After a brief hesitation, I set off along a high forest track to my left.

The veil of stratocumulus clouds that has been rainlessly blanketing the country all week has not relented yet, but since my last walk just a day ago the light has subtly shifted. Maybe the clouds are a little higher, a little thinner, I’m not meteorologically qualified to guess, but I can certainly feel a difference.

The light still has a slightly flat quality to it, but there is infinitesimally more brightness underneath. It has a cool whitish tone to it that I think of as wintrel.

(Mainly because I love the word wintrel, even though it is not, in fact, a word. In fact google just confirmed that I am miss-spelling wintry, unless of course I am referring to a historical English surname with its roots in the medieval period…)

I don’t care. I’m sticking with it. There is a wintrel light today, and I love it.

The beginning of the path on the forest edge is scarred, or enhanced, depending on your viewpoint, by several huge fallen trees. On closer inspection though, these formiddable beasts are actually only limbs, branches severed from enormous beech trees alongside the path, presumably remnants from our most recent storm.

Some of the trees are now slightly lopsided in shape, shorn of such major boughs, but still appear thriving, so will hopefully recover. I imagine all the tiny creatures that can at least take shelter in the woody depths of the fallen branches.

The pathway is now well littered with leaves of wide-ranging hue, and as well as the crunch of acorns spotted here and there with bright sweet chestnuts.

The canopy folds around the path making inviting archways appear ahead as my footsteps rustle forward, twists and turns, holloways, and constantly changing colours in the surrounding leaves.

Incredible ivy and a sense of magic ancient woodland…

Further on in the path I am drawn in by the incredible tangle of ancient ivy branches, twisting sinuously around the tree trunks, the decorative and magical work of decades of growth.

Contrary to some peoples worries about ivy stealing life from the trees, it is not a parasitic plant, taking its water from its own roots in the ground, and only extremely dense ivy covering the crown of a tree would have the potential to cause problems.

For the most part, as ivy grows up the outside of a tree trunk, maturing and thickening over time, it merely uses the tree as its support, and as it does do it offers shelter to insects and potential nesting sites to birds, increasing the biodiversity around the tree.

There is something magical to me about the way it winds and climbs, and I always seek the magical from the apparently every day in any walk. (see – The secrets of the mountain, my last walk, with a surprise stone circle)

The path gradually descends through the woodland and meets a turning point onto the canal path. A pretty little low sided bridge traversing the canal on one side and a feeder on the other.

Calming reflections on the canal, soft leaf fall and busy birds…

In the presence of the water, there is an immediate and curious juxtaposition of still calm and gentle movement, as leaves from the canopy float softly down to land on its surface, and the rustlings of numerous birds and squirrels can be heard in the trees.

The path stretches ahead with autumn colours reflective in the shallow waters, and I ramble happily along, greeting plentiful dog walkers and birders as leaves occasionally settle in my hair.

Both the canal itself and the path along the bank are busy with industrious bird life. Moorhens squawking a noisy argument as they drift along pretending to be the picture of serenity, and mallards plopping gently into the lucent waters and drifting with relaxed purpose.

Further boughs from fallen trees have formed makeshift islands on which birds can be spotted landing, and occasionally ducks sleeping.

There is constant movement from the trees along the bank, I spot the suggestion of wrens before the secretive tiny birds disppear ( I love a wren) and a brief meeting of long-tailed tits takes place in the branches immediately above me.

A squirrel dashes with utmost inelegance from a bough on one side of the canal to the other, hanging precariously for a moment before scuttling busily away, no doubt to stash additions to an enormous stash of acorns.

Not to be left out, a magpie lands in a stark bare branch just off the path, his shiny monochrome gilding a contrast to the muted softness of the autumn colours around him.

Being silhouetted against the light, he is difficult to capture, but he hops comically from one branch to another, seeming to occasionally peer over at me, before continuing to peck at the tiny dinner filled moss on the branches with fierce concentration.

Continuing along the path, and beginning now to approach the end of the stretch of canal, I suddenly catch a flash of blue from the corner of my eye.

Many wildlife photographers come to this location specifically to capture them, but I am overjoyed by the mere sighting, a kingfisher, flying away from me, the blue outline of his wings a momentary sheen in the autumn light, swoops gracefully under a wooden bridge ahead of me and disappears from sight.

Fantastic fungi and feathered friends…

Beside the last remnants of visible canal, a profusion of fungi is still blooming, some of them so miniscule that at first I miss them, huddled furtively on the moss next to their larger companions.

The boldest of all little birds, and always the best chance of getting close, a fat little robin lands next to me in a branch and I instantly still.

I am close enough to see that he is carrying a strand of white feather in his beak, which he seems to have forgotten all about, looking casually about him apparently deciding which branch to bob to next.

The canal side offers restorative, peaceful life and beauty…

The end of the canal section is like an oil painting of soft autumn colour and tranquility, the water trickling peaceably into its source. The waters here, with their ancient industrial heritage, have a stillness and purity, imbued with decades of natures reign. An innate calm, that is nevertheless suffused with life.

My path traces now back up through the depths of trees, ivy and gnarled trunks, I take my time, not just because of the climb, but because I am reluctant to return to civilisation.

At the last crossing of the bridge, I tune in again to the changing sense of light, the changing colour of autumn. For one moment, I allow myself to be absorbed completely, restoratively, and gratefully, my head in the clouds of the rich autumn canopy.

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