Dartmoor CAM

This walk: 2011-11-30. Gutter Tor, Sheep's Tor, Leather Tor, Sharpitor, Scout Hut, cists, trig. point, Ditsworthy Warren House, rock pan, Gutter Tor Cross, unfinished apple crusher, vermin traps (with list of 8), Elbow Gutter, pillow mounds / rabbit "buries", kennel, ferret cage, honey fungus, Disney-esque tree.

Walk details below - Information about the route etc.

Looking up at Gutter Tor, SX 578 668, elevation 340 metres (1115 feet) from near the car park.

View to Sheep's Tor, SX 566 682, elevation 369 metres (1210 feet).

Zoomed view to Leather Tor (SX 563 700, elevation 380 metres or 1246 feet) with Sharpitor (SX 560 703, elevation 410 metres or 1345 feet) behind and left.

View to the Scout Hut (previously known as Ditsworthy Bungalow) from near the car park.

Cist at SX 57669 67130, described by J. Butler (1994), Dartmoor Atlas of Antiquities III, 49.5 Gutter Tor settlements and cairns, fig. 49-6, pages 116-118.

The cist with Gutter Tor behind.

Another view of the cist.

Almost at the top of the hill leading up to Gutter Tor.

Trig. point at SX 57530 66753, near Gutter Tor.

View to Gutter Tor from near the trig. point.

PLaques on the trig. point which has been adopted by the Plymouth Section of Dartmoor Search & Rescue Group.

The top plaque .....

The lower plaque.

A second cist at SX 57597 66812, below the trig. point that is visible on the skyline, again, described by J. Butler (1994), Dartmoor Atlas of Antiquities III, 49.5 Gutter Tor settlements and cairns, fig. 49-6, pages 116-118.

Approaching Gutter Tor.

Zoomed view to Ditsworthy Warren House.

The rock pan on the top of Gutter Tor, a feature that results from weathering of the granite ..... note the smaller pan above the main pan .....

Another view, highlighting the lip in the pan.

Looking down on the Scout Hut.

Gutter Tor Cross, discovered in Dec. 2009, at SX 57886 66773 .....

Closer view.

A nearby unfinished apple crusher, millstone or round trough at SX 57883 66758.

The apple crusher (foreground) with the cross (and Scout Hut trees) behind.

Vermin trap at SX 57883 66758, very near the apple crusher seen above. Vermin traps are generally marked by converging pairs of walls that channel stoats and other vermin into the trap. These are important because the rabbit warrener had a problem with vermin taking rabbits that were bred to feed meat to the tinners. The trap consisted of a long stone box with grooves near each end in the long side stones to house a falling shutter; a cover stone with two holes to house Y-shaped sticks that prop up other sticks that were attached by string to the falling slate shutters. The shutters were released by the stoat etc. stepping on a pressure plate in the middle of the trap and releasing the strings and, thereby, the falling shutters.

List of vermin traps added from the Dartefacts web site:
No. 1 at SX58087 66999, No. 2 at SX 58124 66941, No. 3 at SX 58243 66896, No. 4 at SX 58048 66472, No. 5 at SX 57814 66493, No. 6 at SX 57882 66747 + nearby millstone & recumbent cross, No. 7 at SX 57813 66846, No. 8 at SX 57769 66911.

View of the entrance to the trap .....

Second trap, at SX 57817 66498.

The nearby top cover of the vermin trap.

A third trap down in a gert at SX 58041 66467.

View of a nearby pillow mound, rabbit "bury" or warren, end view.

Approaching Ditsworthy Warren House.

The Bog Shed, to the left of the house in the previous photo, where the rabbits were cleaned.

Ruins of the peat store.

The main building, used in the making of Steven Spielberg's film, War Horse.

The stone structure outside this end of the house is known as The Trough (see next photo) .....

Water from a branch of the leat (called Elbow Gutter, a branch of Langstone Leat) ran into it from behind (now blocked). A pipe leads from here and probably conveyed pot water into the kitchen where it flowed directly onto a stone slab. The area in this photograph is believed to have been a granite-walled reservoir and the slotted posts believed to have supported a knife sharpener that could have been a circular grindstone. Sharp knives were an important part of a warrener's life. Ed: I remember as a child helping my dad to sharpen knives and axes on the old farmyard wheel, made of yellow sandstone. My job was to pour the water onto the wheel and then turn the handle while he held the blade to the stone. There is a similar stone here although our's was on an iron frame.

The leat is described in an article entitled Forgotten Waterways in Dartmoor News, Issue 123, November/December 2011, pages 36-39.

Another view.

One of three dog kennels built into the various walls around the back garden, believed to be so-built so that dogs could get out of the wind, no matter which direction it was coming from.

A ferret cage!

Believed honey fungus .....

As previous photo.

A very Disney-esque, worn out, old tree.

Part of a gate post in the outside building that uses a part of a vermin trap: the top stone is grooved (left of the gatehanger).

Two pillow mounds with Legis Tor in the background.

Elbow Gutter, the minor leat, running on from Ditsworthy Warren House, with Gutter Tor behind .....

The same, coming from Ditsworthy Warren House with pillow mounds and fields of Hentor Warren and Hen Tor behind on the other side of the valley of the Plym.

Zoomed view to Legis Tor, at SX 571 676, elevation 310 metres (1017 feet).

The Scout Hut, previously known as Ditsworthy Bungalow.

Walk details

MAP: Red = GPS satellite track of the walk.

This walk was reached by driving over the Burrator Dam, out through Sheepstor village, turning left onto the dead-end road to the Scout Hut, parking at the yellow cross and the P symbol on the map.

Statistics
Distance - 4.66 km / 2.9 miles.