Cors Goch National Nature Reserve

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Overview

The Cors Goch NNR lies in the bed of an ancient glacial lake which filled with peat as plant life thrived and died over the past 10,000 years. In addition to the rarer lowland fen habitat, there are also areas of open water, heath and grassland. The swamp supports plants such as great pond sedge, bottle brush sedge and common reed, while the lime-rich fen is characterised by species such as black bog rush and blunt-flowered rush. On the drier heathland and grassland areas, flowers among the heather and cross-leaved heath include bog asphodel, western gorse, pale heath violet and fragrant orchid. The reserve is also an important for both breeding and overwintering birds, and a particularly rich insect and invertebrate population, including dragonflies, butterflies and over 250 species of moth. This exceptional mixture of habitats is important for much of the wildlife, which also includes great crested newts and adders.

Location

Llanbedrgoch

About the area

Some of the oldest rocks in Britain form the 125-mile coastline of the 85 square mile Anglesey Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, which includes Holy Island with its busy port of Holyhead, the terminus for the Dublin ferry. The terrain inland is mainly a fertile plateau worn flat by the action of the sea, with low ridges and shallow valleys, while the sheer limestone cliffs of the east coast and on the north coast at Holyhead Mountain represent some of the most spectacular sea cliffs in Britain.