Dr Olver wished to see some of the sites in Martley he had heard about but not visited, so it was on the very best day of early spring that eight of us set out.  February 19th dawned misty and cold but with the sun coming through.  Up on the Berrow it was ethereal and wonderful, we have not in recent memory had days like this so it was truly appreciated. Kindly note that all of these sites are on private land; we hope through arrangement to be able to take parties to them once or twice a year.

Permian Pit

With kind permission from John Walker of Lower Tedney we climbed the southern end of Berrow to a pit dug into rocks of Permian age, a time (250-300Ma) when the land was dry but subject to flash floods that tumbled the ruins of ancient mountains from all directions, leaving them, over subsequent eras, to solidify into a breccia.

Exposures are often known by the name of the place they were first properly documented, and in this case it was Haffield House near Ledbury.  The small pit on The Berrow shows an excellent example of Haffield Breccia.  A breccia is a sedimentary rock made of many different sizes of fragments (clasts), mainly angular with some rounding to show they have been washed down wadis for only a short distance.  The same process can be seen in deserts today.

The other thing that fascinates me is that the breccia is made up of different types of rock fragments, because the mountains that were eroded could themselves have been of varied rock types from different ages. A useful exercise at the Berrow would be a clast analysis to find just what is represented there.

Coal
On up the steep hill above the pit, and into rough forested ground beyond the fence, into a different period–the Carboniferous.  It has been reported previously in these posts that we found coal on Berrow, just as locals had many, many years ago.

This time, armed with more stalwart assistants and a shovel or two we found a likely spot under the trees, trying to maintain balance on the steep hillside.  There was the grey fire clay, under the loamy topsoil, just a few inches down, and in it, lumps of solid black-yes, coal!  You wouldn’t buy it from your local friendly coal merchant, but nevertheless, coal it was.  I think John is going for planning to open a new pit, Parish Council be warned.  There are three old coal pits on the hillside,

reminiscent of small volcanic craters, LIDAR surveys show them up well.  One is just beyond the fence and we spotted a second, further on up the track towards the top of the hill.  No. 3 remains for us, as yet undiscovered.

Collins Green
Thanks to William Rucker we ventured into Collins Green quarry.  Should you be driving over Ankerdine hill from the south (Talbot side) you might be unaware that just past the lay-by on the left there is very little indeed between you and a vertical drop of 30 feet or more–so don’t swerve!

The overgrown quarry, source of Much Wenlock limestone, is important for two reasons really, one is the unconformity between the Silurian limestone overlain in the more southerly end by Permian (Haffield Breccia).  In addition and not always easily visible, is a bentonite (volcanic ash) layer, to be seen in the Wenlock through much of Martley.  This whole site is overgrown and untidy with rubbish (suitcases,

large gas bottles) thrown over from the road above, but it is a SSSI (Site of Special Scientific Interest). I understand clearance work is to be undertaken to remove scrub and allow rare flowers to come back into their own; once re-fenced, sheep will be introduced to graze and maintain the system.

Petrifying Stream
Streams laden with lime trickle out of these hillsides at the spring lines.

There is a good example that we inspected, on the west of the Ankerdine road.  In the stream, tufa formations everywhere, on twigs, snail shells, roots; the stream bed has a very distinct ‘tufa colour’ look about it and water oozes out of numerous underground drips and springs just a few yards up the hill.

All of this took much more time than planned; an excellent lunch at the Talbot didn’t help so we did not see all of the sites we wished. Our final visit in the afternoon was to check out conglomerate boulders found along the base of the (east) side of Berrow, exposed in garden works and through ploughing.  Paul’s conclusion was that these boulders, made of, we believe Miss Phillips Conglomerate, had been brought here from their source in Malvern, by glacial or other processes.  Evidence of this derives from one side of the rounded boulders being flat, indicative of their being held in ice and ground along the land surface below, using it as a giant belt sander.