A Worrying Looking Pond, Kingshill Nature Reserve

Image: © Ian Dodds Taken: 12 Jun 2021

Since starting posting pictures on this site a year ago, I have learnt a lot of things, but have also realised a lot of things that spring up from researching the pictures are far too complicated to grasp without putting a lot of time in. The pollutive after-effects of mining operations fall into this category for me! That said, this fenced-off small pond doesn't look too clever. Water was pouring in - I'm not sure why at quite such a rate - and pouring out from underneath the fence, flooding nearby paths, and forming other wetlands nearby. Red water is almost always a sign of bad pollution round here, that much I do know. The nature reserve is sited on the grounds of a fairly recent large colliery, which came into being at the end of the First World War and shut up shop in 1968. At its height it boasted a workforce of 1,500. This is why Allanton, the village just to the North, exists - OS maps of the 1890s show no real settlement round here, just scattered houses, estates and farms.

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