TheRiver Ottery (Cornish:Otri)[1] is a small river in northeastCornwall, England, United Kingdom. The river is about twenty miles (32 km) long from its source southeast ofOtterham to its confluence with theRiver Tamar atNether Bridge, two miles (3.2 km) northeast ofLaunceston.[2][3]
Theheadwaters of the River Ottery are within thecivil parish ofOtterham but formerly came under the parish ofForrabury and Minster. In 1311, the rector of that parish wrote: "..the river Ottery takes its rise in this parish and flows to Canworthy Water and so by Yeolmbridge to the river Tamar."[4]
With itstributaries, the River Ottery forms a major sub-catchment of the Tamar system, draining 48 square miles (120 km2) of north Cornwall. The Ottery'scatchment area is within theCarboniferous geological formation known as theCulm Measures which stretches fromDartmoor to north Devon and across northeast Cornwall as far west asBodmin Moor.[2][5]
The infant river initially flows north until it reaches the hamlet ofTrengune. From here it adopts an east-southeasterly course which it follows to its confluence with the River Tamar.
The largest tributaries to the River Ottery are Caudworthy Water and Bolsbridge Water which join the Ottery from the north and Canworthy Water which joins from the south.
The River Ottery system was severely affected by flooding in north Cornwall on16 August 2004 when up to eight inches of rain fell during a single afternoon.[6] The Ottery headwaters at Marshgate and Otterham were the most severely affected.
The river flows through an isolated area of mixed farming and the only riverside settlements of any size areCanworthy Water andYeolmbridge.
The Cornwall Rivers Project notes fiveSites of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI) in the Ottery catchment including the Ottery Valley SSSI which has 33 hectares of increasingly threatened culm habitat and Kernick and Ottery Meadows SSSI, also noted for itsbiological interest.[7][8]
The project's page also notes: "The Ottery supports a broad range of wildlife including populations oftrout and migratory fish,otters,kingfishers,sand martins,dippers,curlews,snipe and themarsh fritillary butterfly."[2]
The majority of the boundary between Cornwall and Devon follows the River Tamar, and Celtic place-names, such as those including the elementtre-, stop for the most part exactly at the Tamar, reflecting this ancient boundary. However, the part of Cornwall north of the River Ottery has few place-names includingtre- and far more of Old English origin (such as those ending in-dun and-cot) than the rest of the county. This indicates that the river formed an early boundary between the rump ofDumnonia and the westward expansion of theAnglo-Saxon kingdom ofWessex.[9][10]
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