Milbury Heath is a hamlet in South Gloucestershire

South Gloucestershire

South Gloucestershire is a unitary district in the ceremonial county of Gloucestershire, in South West England.-History:The district was created in 1996, when the county of Avon was abolished, by the merger of former area of the districts of Kingswood and Northavon...

, located east of Thornbury

Thornbury, South Gloucestershire

Thornbury is a market town in South Gloucestershire, England, approximately 12 miles north of the city of Bristol, with a population of 12,342 at the 2001 UK census. The town hosts South Gloucestershire Council headquarters and is twinned with Bockenem in Germany. Thornbury is a Britain in Bloom...

. The hamlet has a garden centre

Garden centre

A garden centre is a retail firm that sells plants and products related to gardens as its primary business. It is open to the public, with facilities to care for and display plants.- UK :...

 and a few other farm shops. The heath is a local high point (109m asl at ) and offers quite good views West across the Severn Vale, and North into the Vale of Berkeley; (for a good view East to the Cotswold Edge, it is better to proceed to Tytherington Hill about a mile to the South). A seat at the viewpoint commemorates the centenary of Falfield

Falfield

Falfield is a village, located near the northern border of the South Gloucestershire district of Gloucestershire, England. The area has a Wotton-under-Edge post code and so is often incorrectly listed as being in the Stroud district of Gloucestershire....

 Parish Council in 1994. The hamlet has a former (Methodist?) chapel now converted to a private house, and a recently-restored duck-pond.

The hamlet is on the Avon Cycleway. Both the A38 road

A38 road

The A38, part of which is also known as the Devon Expressway, is a major A-class trunk road in England.The road runs from Bodmin in Cornwall to Mansfield in Nottinghamshire. It is long, making it one of the longest A-roads in England. It was formerly known as the Leeds — Exeter Trunk Road,...

 and M5 motorway

M5 motorway

The M5 is a motorway in England. It runs from a junction with the M6 at West Bromwich near Birmingham to Exeter in Devon. Heading south-west, the M5 runs east of West Bromwich and west of Birmingham through Sandwell Valley...

 pass nearby. Just to the north on the A38, (technically in Buckover), is the 'White Horse' pub.

Robin killing controversy

The garden centre at Milbury Heath has come under fire due the treatment of robin

European Robin

The European Robin , most commonly known in Anglophone Europe simply as the Robin, is a small insectivorous passerine bird that was formerly classed as a member of the thrush family , but is now considered to be an Old World flycatcher...

s who were nesting there and were sometimes flying in the cafeteria section. They were killed after getting permission from DEFRA. This sparked controversy among many groups, including the RSPCA. The garden centre defended the killings by claiming they were "a pest" and a "health hazard".

External links

• RSPCA questions killing of robins (BBC News)
• DEFRA report