ABSTRACT
The Stour Valley is both typical and unique: it has its own demographic profile, economic practices and social activities, a particular place in history, and local ecological characteristics. The River Stour is approximately 96 kilometres in length: it emerges from greensand at Stour Head on the Wiltshire border, various tributaries join it around Gillingham and Marnhull, and it flows southwards into the sea at Christchurch. Travelling from the rich uplands of the Blackmore Vale into the floodplains of its lower reaches, the Stour runs from a rural heartland into the industrial conurbations of Bournemouth and Poole. Socio-economic and environmental changes in the Stour Valley follow a familiar historical pattern: an accelerating intensification of land use and population growth, accompanied by the privatisation of land and resources and a steady shift from rural to urban areas. The wealth of the Stour Valley improved greatly with the introduction of water meadows in the 1630s.
