Monument record 15393 - Basin Mire adjacent to Hatch Mere

<1> Leah, MD; Wells, CE; Appleby, C; Huckerby, E, 1997, The Wetlands of Cheshire (North West Wetlands Survey 4), p190-1, 115 (Monograph). SCH3260.

A kettle hole site with deep peat deposits adjacent to Hatch Mere was investigated by the North West Wetlands project, an archaeological and paleoecological study of the varied wetlands of Cheshire, undertaken between 1993-95. It forms part of a series of wetlands around Delamere on the Mid-Cheshire Ridge, the sandstone escarpment which divides the eastern and western portions of the Cheshire Plain. During the last glaciation, the Mouldsworth drainage channel opened out here onto the east Cheshire Plain. The channel marks the point where a late-Glacial lake formed in front of the ice, which had temporarily stabilised along the western margins of the Ridge. Outwash sands were deposited in this lake and the final disappearance of glacial conditions resulted in an irregular surface, containing numerous hollows left by melting ice blocks. It was in these depressions that many of Delamere's wetlands subsequently developed.

The site, a small basin mire, was one of two mires chosen as representative examples from the many kettle hole sites scattered through the Delamere Forest area, the other being Black Lake mire (CHER 15383). Six metres of organic sediments were recorded, with the basal metre consisting of gyttjas, with a pollen assemblage indicating that deposition commenced in the immediate post-glacial period. The rest of the stratigraphy consisted of wood peats, reed and sedge peats and finally 2m of Eriophorum/Calluna/Sphagnum peats. The nature of the pollen assemblage from a sample taken 0.5m from the surface indicated the possibility that the peat archive may be untruncated. The NWW assessment at Hatch Mere examined three samples at 0.50m, 5.65m and 6.40m depths. These similarly suggest that deposition commenced in the immediate post-Glacial and that the stratigraphy may be untruncated indicating that, significantly, the site probably contains a complete vegetational record of the Flandrian period and consequently of the prehistoric and historic periods.