Biddenham Pit is a gravel pit and

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 of ...

(SSSI), 0.41

hectares The hectare (; SI symbol: ha) is a non-SI metric unit of area equal to a square with 100-metre sides (1 hm2), or 10,000 m2, and is primarily used in the measurement of land. There are 100 hectares in one square kilometre. An acre is ab ...

in size located in

Biddenham Biddenham is a large village and a civil parish in Bedfordshire, England, located to the west of Bedford near the A428 road. The village largely serves as a dormitory settlement for Bedford, and also for commuters to London, being on the same si ...

Bedfordshire Bedfordshire (; abbreviated Beds) is a ceremonial county in the East of England. The county has been administered by three unitary authorities, Borough of Bedford, Central Bedfordshire and Borough of Luton, since Bedfordshire County Council wa ...

. The pit was notified to

Bedford Borough Council Bedford Borough Council is the local authority of the Borough of Bedford in Bedfordshire, England. It is a unitary authority, having the powers of a non-metropolitan county and district council combined. The executive of the council is the direct ...

and

Bedfordshire County Council Bedfordshire County Council was the county council of the non-metropolitan county of Bedfordshire in England. It was established on 24 January 1889 and was abolished on 1 April 2009. The county council was based in Bedford. In 1997 Luton Borough ...

under the Wildlife and Countryside Act (1981) in 1988, and is also a

Geological Conservation Review The Geological Conservation Review (GCR) is produced by the UK's Joint Nature Conservation Committee and is designed to identify those sites of national and international importance needed to show all the key scientific elements of the geological a ...

site. The site is owned by

Persimmon Homes Persimmon plc is a British housebuilding company, headquartered in York, England. The company is named after a horse which won the 1896 Derby and St. Leger for the Prince of Wales (the future Edward VII). It is listed on the London Stock Ex ...

and Kier Homes, with management advice given by

Natural England Natural England is a non-departmental public body in the United Kingdom sponsored by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. It is responsible for ensuring that England's natural environment, including its land, flora and fauna, ...

. The pit provides an intact and visually inspectable

terrace Terrace may refer to: Landforms and construction * Fluvial terrace, a natural, flat surface that borders and lies above the floodplain of a stream or river * Terrace, a street suffix * Terrace, the portion of a lot between the public sidewalk a ...

gravel Gravel is a loose aggregation of rock fragments. Gravel occurs naturally throughout the world as a result of sedimentary and erosive geologic processes; it is also produced in large quantities commercially as crushed stone. Gravel is classifi ...

, both

silt Silt is granular material of a size between sand and clay and composed mostly of broken grains of quartz. Silt may occur as a soil (often mixed with sand or clay) or as sediment mixed in suspension with water. Silt usually has a floury feel when ...

y and

clay Clay is a type of fine-grained natural soil material containing clay minerals (hydrous aluminium phyllosilicates, e.g. kaolin, Al2 Si2 O5( OH)4). Clays develop plasticity when wet, due to a molecular film of water surrounding the clay par ...

ey, which has been laid down by the

River Great Ouse The River Great Ouse () is a river in England, the longest of several British rivers called "Ouse". From Syresham in Northamptonshire, the Great Ouse flows through Buckinghamshire, Bedfordshire, Cambridgeshire and Norfolk to drain into the Wa ...

. Several features of scientific interest have been identified in the deposits -

interglacial An interglacial period (or alternatively interglacial, interglaciation) is a geological interval of warmer global average temperature lasting thousands of years that separates consecutive glacial periods within an ice age. The current Holocene in ...

mollusca Mollusca is the second-largest phylum of invertebrate animals after the Arthropoda, the members of which are known as molluscs or mollusks (). Around 85,000 extant species of molluscs are recognized. The number of fossil species is esti ...

and

mammalian Mammals () are a group of vertebrate animals constituting the class (biology), class Mammalia (), characterized by the presence of mammary glands which in Female#Mammalian female, females produce milk for feeding (nursing) their young, a ...

remains have been found, possible

microfossil A microfossil is a fossil that is generally between 0.001 mm and 1 mm in size, the visual study of which requires the use of light or electron microscopy. A fossil which can be studied with the naked eye or low-powered magnification, ...

material as well as evidence of a prolific

Paleolithic The Paleolithic or Palaeolithic (), also called the Old Stone Age (from Greek: παλαιός ''palaios'', "old" and λίθος ''lithos'', "stone"), is a period in human prehistory that is distinguished by the original development of stone too ...

industry in the lowest layers of the gravel. Its last official inspection by a Natural England staff member found the whole site and more specifically the gravel feature inside it to be in a 'Favourable' condition. There is access by a footpath from Malcote Close.

References

{{coord, 52.142, -0.507 , type:landmark_region:GB-BNE, display=title Geological Conservation Review sites Sites of Special Scientific Interest in Bedfordshire