Nob End is the site of a former waste tip which is now a

Site of Special Scientific Interest A Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI) in Great Britain, or an Area of Special Scientific Interest (ASSI) in the Isle of Man and Northern Ireland, is a conservation designation denoting a protected area in the United Kingdom and Isle ...

and Local Nature Reserve near

Little Lever Little Lever is a village in the Metropolitan Borough of Bolton, Greater Manchester, England. Within the historic county of Lancashire, it is southeast of Bolton, west of Radcliffe and southwest of Bury. In the 19th century, the population ...

and

Kearsley Kearsley ( ) is a town in the Metropolitan Borough of Bolton, Greater Manchester, England. The population at the United Kingdom Census 2011, 2011 census was 14,212. Within the Historic County of Lancashire, it lies northwest of Manchester, ...

, in

Greater Manchester Greater Manchester is a ceremonial county in North West England. It borders Lancashire to the north, Derbyshire and West Yorkshire to the east, Cheshire to the south, and Merseyside to the west. Its largest settlement is the city of Manchester. ...

, England.

History

Standing at the confluence of the

River Irwell The River Irwell ( ) is a tributary of the River Mersey in north-west England. It rises at Irwell Springs on Deerplay Moor, approximately north of Bacup and flows southwards for to meet the Mersey near Irlam Locks. The Irwell marks the bound ...

and

River Croal The River Croal is a river located in Greater Manchester, England. It is a tributary of the River Irwell. Rising at the confluence of Middle Brook and Deane Church Brook, it flows eastwards through Bolton, collecting ''Gilnow Brook'' and th ...

the site was used around 1850-70 as a tip for toxic alkaline waste from the production of

sodium carbonate Sodium carbonate (also known as washing soda, soda ash, sal soda, and soda crystals) is the inorganic compound with the formula and its various hydrates. All forms are white, odourless, water-soluble salts that yield alkaline solutions in water ...

(soda ash) by the

Leblanc process The Leblanc process was an early industrial process for making ''soda ash'' ( sodium carbonate) used throughout the 19th century, named after its inventor, Nicolas Leblanc. It involved two stages: making sodium sulfate from sodium chloride, fol ...

. The waste, known as ' galligu', was a blue sludge (from reduced iron compounds) dominated by calcium sulphide and smelling of bad eggs. The surface of the waste has since weathered down to

calcium carbonate Calcium carbonate is a chemical compound with the chemical formula . It is a common substance found in Rock (geology), rocks as the minerals calcite and aragonite, most notably in chalk and limestone, eggshells, gastropod shells, shellfish skel ...

, and calcicolous vegetation has colonised the site. As natural limestone grassland does not occur in Greater Manchester, many of the species found are rare in the county. The 8.8

hectare The hectare (; SI symbol: ha) is a non-SI metric unit of area equal to a square with 100-metre sides (1 hm2), that is, square metres (), and is primarily used in the measurement of land. There are 100 hectares in one square kilometre. ...

(21.7 acres)site became a

SSSI A Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI) in Great Britain, or an Area of Special Scientific Interest (ASSI) in the Isle of Man and Northern Ireland, is a conservation designation denoting a protected area in the United Kingdom and Isle ...

in 1988, and a Local Nature Reserve in 2000. In 1936 a major breach in the now defunct Manchester Bolton & Bury Canal occurred east of the Nob End locks; it has never been repaired.

Habitats

There are a number of different habitats on the site, the creation of which were dependent upon: the type of waste deposited, the pattern of deposition and the nature of the underlying substrate: * Open, species rich, calcicolous grassland. *

Fescue ''Festuca'' (fescue) is a genus of flowering plants belonging to the grass family Poaceae (subfamily Pooideae). They are evergreen or herbaceous perennial tufted grasses with a height range of and a cosmopolitan distribution, occurring on every ...

grassland with

salix Willows, also called sallows and osiers, of the genus ''Salix'', comprise around 350 species (plus numerous hybrids) of typically deciduous trees and shrubs, found primarily on moist soils in cold and temperate regions. Most species are known ...

scrub. * Wet areas with rushes, marsh plants and salix scrub. *

Neutral Neutral or neutrality may refer to: Mathematics and natural science Biology * Neutral organisms, in ecology, those that obey the unified neutral theory of biodiversity Chemistry and physics * Neutralization (chemistry), a chemical reaction in ...

grasslands. * Acid grasslands.

Flora

The flora found on the site includes: many types of

Orchid Orchids are plants that belong to the family Orchidaceae (), a diverse and widespread group of flowering plants with blooms that are often colourful and fragrant. Orchids are cosmopolitan plants that are found in almost every habitat on Eart ...

Broomrape ''Orobanche'', commonly known as broomrape, is a genus of almost 200 species of small parasitic herbaceous plants, mostly native to the temperate Northern Hemisphere. It is the type genus of the broomrape family Orobanchaceae. It is a weed on ...

, Twayblade, Blue fleabane and Carline thistle.

References

{{coord, 53.553, -2.379, display=title, region:GB_type:landmark Sites of Special Scientific Interest in Greater Manchester Geography of the Metropolitan Borough of Bolton Local Nature Reserves in Greater Manchester

History

Habitats

Flora

See also

References