Paston Great Barn - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

Paston Great Barn is a mediaeval barn

Barn

A barn is an agricultural building used for storage and as a covered workplace. It may sometimes be used to house livestock or to store farming vehicles and equipment...

, near Paston Hall on the southeast edge of the village of Paston

Paston, Norfolk

Paston is a village and civil parish in the English county of Norfolk. The village is north-east of North Walsham and south-east of Cromer. It is north-east of the city of Norwich. The village sits astride the coast road between Mundesley and Bacton. The nearest railway station is at North...

, in northeast Norfolk

Norfolk

Norfolk is a low-lying county in the East of England. It has borders with Lincolnshire to the west, Cambridgeshire to the west and southwest and Suffolk to the south. Its northern and eastern boundaries are the North Sea coast and to the north-west the county is bordered by The Wash. The county...

, England

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

. It is owned by the North Norfolk Historic Buildings Trust. It dates from 1581 and is associated with the Paston family. It is a Scheduled Ancient Monument

Scheduled Ancient Monument

In the United Kingdom, a scheduled monument is a 'nationally important' archaeological site or historic building, given protection against unauthorized change. The various pieces of legislation used for legally protecting heritage assets from damage and destruction are grouped under the term...

and a Listed Building.

The barn itself

It is a long, low barn, with a thatched roof, and walls built of brick

Brick

A brick is a block of ceramic material used in masonry construction, usually laid using various kinds of mortar. It has been regarded as one of the longest lasting and strongest building materials used throughout history.-History:...

, flint

Flint

Flint is a hard, sedimentary cryptocrystalline form of the mineral quartz, categorized as a variety of chert. It occurs chiefly as nodules and masses in sedimentary rocks, such as chalks and limestones. Inside the nodule, flint is usually dark grey, black, green, white, or brown in colour, and...

and limestone

Limestone

Limestone is a sedimentary rock composed largely of the minerals calcite and aragonite, which are different crystal forms of calcium carbonate . Many limestones are composed from skeletal fragments of marine organisms such as coral or foraminifera....

. It has large doors with timber lintels. The barn was commissioned by Sir William Paston III as a grain store and threshing barn. It is approximately 70 metres long, 9 metres wide and 16 metres high. Its has been granted Grade II* Listed Building status by English Heritage

English Heritage

English Heritage . is an executive non-departmental public body of the British Government sponsored by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport...

due to its architectural and historical importance. There are three 30-metre long Victorian wings on the eastern side of the barn, added to house cattle.

The barn and its immediate surroundings, an area of 0.95 hectare

Hectare

The hectare is a metric unit of area defined as 10,000 square metres , and primarily used in the measurement of land. In 1795, when the metric system was introduced, the are was defined as being 100 square metres and the hectare was thus 100 ares or 1/100 km2...

s was notified as a biological Site of Special Scientific Interest by English Nature

English Nature

English Nature was the United Kingdom government agency that promoted the conservation of wildlife, geology and wild places throughout England between 1990 and 2006...

in 1999, and the site has also been designated as a Special Area of Conservation

Special Area of Conservation

A Special Area of Conservation is defined in the European Union's Habitats Directive , also known as the Directive on the Conservation of Natural Habitats and of Wild Fauna and Flora...

.

In 2002, English Nature started a 50-year lease of the barn. There is currently no public access into the barn, partly in order to minimise disturbance to the bats, although some educational interpretation at the site is being considered for the future.

Bats

The barn is one of only three maternity roosts in Britain for the Barbastelle Bat, a species which is rare at a European scale, and it is the only one of the three which is in a building. The colony was discovered in 1996. The Barbastelles mostly roost in large crevices in timber lintels over the barn doors. Their feeding grounds are believed to include nearby coastal cliffs.

Breeding colonies of Natterer's Bat

Natterer's bat

Natterer's bat is a European bat with pale wings. It has brown fur, also seen on the leg wing membrane, tending to white on its underside...

(Myotis nattereri), Brown Long-eared Bat

Brown long-eared bat

The brown long-eared bat or common long-eared bat is a fairly large European bat. It has distinctive ears, long and with a distinctive fold...

(Plecotus auritus) and Common Pipistrelle

Common Pipistrelle

The Common Pipistrelle Pipistrellus pipistrellus is a small pipistrelle bat whose very large range extends across most of Europe, North Africa, southwestern Asia, and possibly into Korea. It is one of the most common bat species in the British Isles....

(Pipistrellus pipistrellus) also inhabit the barn.

External links

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