Did you know
Holme Fen National Nature Reserve is the largest silver birch woodland in lowland England
Woodwalton History
The peat soil at Woodwalton lies on top of a clay basin where an oak forest once stood. Around 6,000 years ago conditions in the region became wetter and the forest gradually drowned. Those remains of the woodland that could not rot down in the waterlogged ground began to form a layer of wood peat . This was followed by reed and sedge peat, and finally by an acid layer from the remains of sphagnum moss.
This process of successive peat formation created a diverse range of wildlife habitats. This feature has sadly degraded due to extensive shrinkage and wasting caused by the draining of the fens which began in ernest around the 17th-century. In the last 150 years the ground level in the area has lowered by a staggering 4 metres!
Woodwalton was purchased in 1910 by the Hon. Charles Rothschild and donated to the Society for the Promotion of Nature Reserves (now the Royal Society for Nature Conservation) in 1919. Despite the perceived protection given to Woodwalton Fen by sympathetic ownership, the draining of surrounding land caused the reserve to dry out. Indeed by the 1930s the Victorian landscape of sedge reed and low-growing fen plants was becoming replaced by a less-desirable dense scrub of sallow, birch and hawthorn. In 1954, Woodwalton was designated a National Nature Reserve. Since the 1950s the pro-active management of the site has sought to reverse the drying out process and therefore conserve this crucial fenland habitat.
