Course and characteristics
In its upper reaches, the Piddle is a chalk stream flowing south through a steep valley cut into the dip slope of the downland, [3] which is dominated by an agricultural landscape of calcareous grassland pasture and arable fields. It rises above the church in Alton Pancras, which was originally named Awultune, a Saxon name meaning the village at the source of a river.
At Puddletown, 6 miles (9.7 km) south of the source, the chalk dips below clay and alluvial sand and gravel geology with a flatter landscape of water-meadows. [3] Here, the Piddle turns to follow an east-south-easterly direction 12 miles (19 km) to Wareham, where it enters Poole Harbour via Wareham Channel. This section of the river runs more or less parallel with its bigger neighbour, the River Frome, together forming a broad, open valley divided by a low ridge of heathland.
The River Frome is a river in Dorset in the south of England. At 30 miles (48 km) long it is the major chalkstream in southwest England. It is navigable upstream from Poole Harbour as far as the town of Wareham.
Poole Harbour is a large natural harbour in Dorset, southern England, with the town of Poole on its shores. The harbour is a drowned valley (ria) formed at the end of the last ice age and is the estuary of several rivers, the largest being the Frome. The harbour has a long history of human settlement stretching to pre-Roman times. The harbour is extremely shallow, with one main dredged channel through the harbour, from the mouth to Holes Bay.
The Isle of Purbeck is a peninsula in Dorset, England. It is bordered by water on three sides: the English Channel to the south and east, where steep cliffs fall to the sea; and by the marshy lands of the River Frome and Poole Harbour to the north. Its western boundary is less well defined, with some medieval sources placing it at Flower's Barrow above Worbarrow Bay. John Hutchins, author of The History and Antiquities of the County of Dorset, defined Purbeck's western boundary as the Luckford Lake steam, which runs south from the Frome. According to writer and broadcaster Ralph Wightman, Purbeck "is only an island if you accept the barren heaths between Arish Mell and Wareham as cutting off this corner of Dorset as effectively as the sea." The most southerly point is St Alban's Head.
Wareham is a historic market town and, under the name Wareham Town, a civil parish, in the English county of Dorset. The town is situated on the River Frome eight miles (13 km) southwest of Poole.
Puddletown is a village and civil parish in Dorset, England. It is situated by the River Piddle, from which it derives its name, about 4.5 miles (7 km) northeast of the county town Dorchester. Its earlier name Piddletown fell out of favour, probably because of connotations of the word "piddle". The name Puddletown was officially sanctioned in the late 1950s. Puddletown's civil parish covers 2,908 hectares and extends to the River Frome to the south. In 2013, the estimated population of the civil parish was 1450.
Alton Pancras is a small village and civil parish in Dorset, England. In the 2011 census the civil parish had a population of 175.
Bere Regis is a village and civil parish in Dorset, England, situated 6 miles (9.7 km) north-west of Wareham. In the 2011 census the civil parish had a population of 1,745.
The Dorset Downs are an area of chalk downland in the centre of the county Dorset in south west England. The downs are the most western part of a larger chalk formation which also includes Cranborne Chase, Salisbury Plain, Hampshire Downs, Chiltern Hills, North Downs and South Downs.
Piddlehinton is a village and civil parish in west Dorset, England, situated in the Piddle valley 5 miles (8.0 km) north of Dorchester. In the 2011 census the parish had a population of 403. Piddlehinton formerly constituted a liberty containing only the parish itself.
Piddletrenthide is a village and civil parish in the English county of Dorset. It is sited by the small River Piddle in a valley on the dip slope of the Dorset Downs, 8 miles (13 km) north of Dorchester. In the 2011 census the parish—which includes the small village of Plush to the northeast—had 323 dwellings, 290 households and a population of 647.
Ridge is a village in the English county of Dorset. It is situated on the south bank of the River Frome, about half a mile due south east of the town of Wareham.
The Hampshire Basin is a geological basin of Palaeogene age in southern England, underlying parts of Hampshire, the Isle of Wight, Dorset, and Sussex. Like the London Basin to the northeast, it is filled with sands and clays of Paleocene and younger ages and it is surrounded by a broken rim of chalk hills of Cretaceous age.
Plush is a small village in the English county of Dorset. It lies within the civil parish of Piddletrenthide in the west of the county, and is approximately 8 miles (13 km) north of the county town Dorchester. It is sited in a small side-valley of the River Piddle at an altitude of 130 metres (430 ft) and is surrounded by chalk hills which rise to 251 metres (823 ft) at Ball Hill, a kilometre to the northeast, and 261 metres (856 ft) at Lyscombe Hill, 2½ kilometres to the east.
Dorset is a county located in the middle of the south coast of England. It lies between the latitudes 50.512°N and 51.081°N and the longitudes 1.682°W and 2.958°W, and occupies an area of 2,653 km2. It spans 90 kilometres (56 mi) from east to west and 63 kilometres (39 mi) from north to south.
The Dorset Heaths form an important area of heathland within the Poole Basin in southern England. Much of the area is protected.
The Frome Valley Trail is a long-distance footpath in Dorset, England which follows the River Frome from Evershot to Dorchester and will, when completed, extend to Poole Harbour.
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