The River Tonge is a short
river
A river is a natural flowing watercourse, usually freshwater, flowing towards an ocean, sea, lake or another river. In some cases, a river flows into the ground and becomes dry at the end of its course without reaching another body of wate ...
, splitting
Bolton
Bolton (, locally ) is a large town in Greater Manchester in North West England, formerly a part of Lancashire. A former mill town, Bolton has been a production centre for textiles since Flemish people, Flemish weavers settled in the area i ...
from
contiguous
Contiguity or contiguous may refer to:
*Contiguous data storage, in computer science
*Contiguity (probability theory)
*Contiguity (psychology)
*Contiguous distribution of species, in biogeography
*Geographic contiguity of territorial land
*Contigu ...
Tonge, both in
Greater Manchester
Greater Manchester is a metropolitan county and combined authority, combined authority area in North West England, with a population of 2.8 million; comprising ten metropolitan boroughs: City of Manchester, Manchester, City of Salford, Salford ...
,
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...
.
The Tonge is formed at the ''Meeting of the Waters'', where
Astley Brook
Astley Brook is a river in Greater Manchester, England.
Rising at the confluence of Dean Brook and Raveden Brook near Halliwell in the Metropolitan Borough of Bolton, it travels eastward to "Meeting of the Waters", where it meets Eagley Brook ...
, from
Smithills
Smithills is a mainly residential suburb of Bolton in Greater Manchester, England. It is northwest of Bolton, south of Blackburn and northwest of Manchester. Smithills lies on the lower south facing slopes of the West Pennine Moors.
Toponymy
T ...
in the west, meets the
Eagley Brook
Eagley Brook (also known during the formative part of its course as Belmont Brook) is a small river of Lancashire and Greater Manchester in England.
Rising at the confluence of several smaller streams at Old Man's Hill in the West Pennine Moors, ...
drawing on more sources to the north. The Tonge meanders southwards, to the east of Bolton, past Springfield where it is joined by
Bradshaw Brook
Bradshaw Brook is a river draining parts of Lancashire and Greater Manchester in Northern England.
Starting life as Cadshaw Brook draining a valley named Green Lowe Clough on Turton Moor, the brook feeds the Turton and Entwistle Reservoir and W ...
, at the end of its route from the Jumbles and Wayoh reservoirs, close to Tonge Fold. The Tonge joins the smaller and thus counterintuitively superseding
Croal at Darcy Lever, shortly before the Croal's confluence with 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. The Irwell marks the boundary be ...
.
Tonge Bridge section is a tract north of Tonge Bridge designated as 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 of ...
(SSSI).
[
] The site comprises the steep west
right bank
In geography, a bank is the land alongside a body of water. Different structures are referred to as ''banks'' in different fields of geography, as follows.
In limnology (the study of inland waters), a stream bank or river bank is the terrai ...
of the river. It was designated an SSSI 1987 for its geological interest, principally the fluvial
sandstone
Sandstone is a clastic sedimentary rock composed mainly of sand-sized (0.0625 to 2 mm) silicate grains. Sandstones comprise about 20–25% of all sedimentary rocks.
Most sandstone is composed of quartz or feldspar (both silicates) ...
which has yielded
pteridosperm
The term Pteridospermatophyta (or "seed ferns" or "Pteridospermatopsida") is a polyphyletic group of extinct seed-bearing plants (spermatophytes). The earliest fossil evidence for plants of this type is the genus ''Elkinsia'' of the late Devonian ...
seeds, known as ''
Trigonocarpus''. The well preserved nature of the seeds make it of considerable sedimentological and palaeogeographic interest.
It is one of only seven geological
SSSIs in Greater Manchester.
In 2017, invasive
walking catfish
The walking catfish (''Clarias batrachus'') is a species of freshwater airbreathing catfish native to Southeast Asia. It is named for its ability to "walk" and wiggle across dry land, to find food or suitable environments. While it does not trul ...
''Clarias'' were recovered from the river.
Tributaries
*
Bradshaw Brook
Bradshaw Brook is a river draining parts of Lancashire and Greater Manchester in Northern England.
Starting life as Cadshaw Brook draining a valley named Green Lowe Clough on Turton Moor, the brook feeds the Turton and Entwistle Reservoir and W ...
(left bank)
*
Eagley Brook
Eagley Brook (also known during the formative part of its course as Belmont Brook) is a small river of Lancashire and Greater Manchester in England.
Rising at the confluence of several smaller streams at Old Man's Hill in the West Pennine Moors, ...
(left bank)
*
Astley Brook
Astley Brook is a river in Greater Manchester, England.
Rising at the confluence of Dean Brook and Raveden Brook near Halliwell in the Metropolitan Borough of Bolton, it travels eastward to "Meeting of the Waters", where it meets Eagley Brook ...
(right bank)
See also
Manchester Bolton & Bury Canal
The Manchester Bolton & Bury Canal is a disused canal in Greater Manchester, England, built to link Bolton and Bury with Manchester. The canal, when fully opened, was long. It was accessed via a junction with the River Irwell in Salford. S ...
References
{{authority control
Tonge, River
Tonge, River
Tonge, River
1Tonge