The Wren's Nest is a geological

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 ...

in the

Dudley Metropolitan Borough The Metropolitan Borough of Dudley is a metropolitan borough of West Midlands, England. It was created in 1974 following the Local Government Act 1972, through a merger of the existing Dudley County Borough with the municipal boroughs of Stou ...

, north west of the town centre of

Dudley Dudley ( , ) is a market town in the West Midlands, England, southeast of Wolverhampton and northwest of Birmingham. Historically part of Worcestershire, the town is the administrative centre of the Metropolitan Borough of Dudley. In the ...

, in the West Midlands of

England England is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is located on the island of Great Britain, of which it covers about 62%, and List of islands of England, more than 100 smaller adjacent islands. It ...

. It is one of the most important geological locations in Britain. It is also a Local Nature Reserve, a national nature reserve (NNR) and

Scheduled Ancient Monument In the United Kingdom, a scheduled monument is a nationally important archaeological site or historic building, given protection against unauthorised change. The various pieces of legislation that legally protect heritage assets from damage, visu ...

. The site is home to a number of species of birds and locally rare

flora Flora (: floras or florae) is all the plant life present in a particular region or time, generally the naturally occurring (indigenous (ecology), indigenous) native plant, native plants. The corresponding term for animals is ''fauna'', and for f ...

, such as '' Scabiosa columbaria'' (small scabious), milkwort and quaking grass. The caverns are also a nationally important hibernation site for seven different species of

bat Bats are flying mammals of the order Chiroptera (). With their forelimbs adapted as wings, they are the only mammals capable of true and sustained flight. Bats are more agile in flight than most birds, flying with their very long spread-out ...

The Wren's Nest National Nature Reserve

Ancient history

The Wren's Nest National Nature Reserve is world-famous geologically for its well-preserved

Silurian The Silurian ( ) is a geologic period and system spanning 23.5 million years from the end of the Ordovician Period, at million years ago ( Mya), to the beginning of the Devonian Period, Mya. The Silurian is the third and shortest period of t ...

coral reef A coral reef is an underwater ecosystem characterized by reef-building corals. Reefs are formed of colonies of coral polyps held together by calcium carbonate. Most coral reefs are built from stony corals, whose polyps cluster in group ...

fossil A fossil (from Classical Latin , ) is any preserved remains, impression, or trace of any once-living thing from a past geological age. Examples include bones, shells, exoskeletons, stone imprints of animals or microbes, objects preserve ...

s. Considered the most diverse and abundant fossil site in the British Isles, more than 700 types of fossil have been found at the site, 86 of which are unique to the location, including '' Calymene blumenbachii'', a

trilobite Trilobites (; meaning "three-lobed entities") are extinction, extinct marine arthropods that form the class (biology), class Trilobita. One of the earliest groups of arthropods to appear in the fossil record, trilobites were among the most succ ...

nicknamed the ''Dudley Bug'' or ''Dudley Locust'' by 18th century quarrymen. An image of this trilobite featured on the town's coat of arms until 1974. The

limestone Limestone is a type of carbonate rock, carbonate sedimentary rock which is the main source of the material Lime (material), lime. It is composed mostly of the minerals calcite and aragonite, which are different Polymorphism (materials science) ...

outcrops belong to the Wenlock Group, which was formed some 420 to 425 million years ago from the material remnants of an ancient tropical sea bed, and contain ripple marks made from the sea's action on the sand. Wren's Nest Hill was extensively quarried during the

Industrial Revolution The Industrial Revolution, sometimes divided into the First Industrial Revolution and Second Industrial Revolution, was a transitional period of the global economy toward more widespread, efficient and stable manufacturing processes, succee ...

for building stone and lime production. The site was originally studied by the Scottish

paleontologist Paleontology, also spelled as palaeontology or palæontology, is the scientific study of the life of the past, mainly but not exclusively through the study of fossils. Paleontologists use fossils as a means to classify organisms, measure geolo ...

Sir

Roderick Murchison Sir Roderick Impey Murchison, 1st Baronet (19 February 1792 – 22 October 1871) was a Scottish geologist who served as director-general of the British Geological Survey from 1855 until his death in 1871. He is noted for investigating and desc ...

, whose work in defining the Silurian System was mainly based on fossils and rock formations found at the site.

Industrial Revolution

Abraham Darby I Abraham Darby, in his later life called Abraham Darby the Elder, now sometimes known for convenience as Abraham Darby I (14 April 1677 – 5 May 1717, the first and best known of Abraham Darby (disambiguation), several men of that name), was ...

, who was one of the fathers of the Industrial Revolution, was born on Wren's Nest Hill in 1678. The caves were mined for hundreds of years for the valuable limestone, used firstly for mortar and agriculture, and then principally iron production during the Industrial Revolution. The Victorians installed the world's first industrial steam engine next to the Wren's Nest, which pumped water from mines and access tunnels. During the height of the Industrial Revolution, up to 20,000 tons of limestone was quarried annually. Local industrialisation was considerable at this time, as the district had become highly industrialised in the heyday of the

Black Country The Black Country is an area of England's West Midlands. It is mainly urban, covering most of the Dudley and Sandwell metropolitan boroughs, with the Metropolitan Borough of Walsall and the City of Wolverhampton. The road between Wolverhampto ...

's industrial past. When quarrying officially finished in 1925, the site was abandoned.

Recent history

Wren's Nest was declared a national nature reserve in 1956, the UK's first national nature reserve for geology. In 2004, Wren's Nest and the nearby Castle Hill were declared Scheduled Ancient Monuments, as they represented the best surviving remains of the limestone industry in

. The most impressive part of this is the last remaining surface opening limestone cavern in the world – formerly reaching more than 100 metres underground – which is known as the Seven Sisters. The workings were originally connected by underground canal to the Dudley Tunnel complex, which has now been blocked off for safety reasons. The Wren's Nest's geological value was first recognised by Sir Roderick Murchison in 1839, and now both the ex-quarry and the tunnels are visited by scientists from all over the world to study its valuable content.

The Seven Sisters tunnel complex

Considered one of the best surviving examples of limestone quarrying, the Seven Sisters caverns had to be filled in after a major roof collapse and mine cave-in occurred in 2001, to prevent further collapse. More recent work had also began on infilling the huge Cathedral Gallery with loose sand. The former limestone mine and adjacent vast underground canal basin, which leads to a now blocked off passage to Dudley Tunnel, contain some of what local historians claimed to be some of the world's most important

geology Geology (). is a branch of natural science concerned with the Earth and other astronomical objects, the rocks of which they are composed, and the processes by which they change over time. Modern geology significantly overlaps all other Earth ...

and

mining Mining is the Resource extraction, extraction of valuable geological materials and minerals from the surface of the Earth. Mining is required to obtain most materials that cannot be grown through agriculture, agricultural processes, or feasib ...

heritage. In 2007, Dudley Council lost out on a £50,000,000 national lottery grant to redevelop and re-open the cavern complex, but did later secure an £800,000 grant from the

Heritage Lottery Fund The National Lottery Heritage Fund, formerly the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF), distributes a share of National Lottery funding, supporting a wide range of heritage projects across the United Kingdom. History The fund's predecessor bodies were ...

for lesser improvements to the site.

External links

Photos of some of the geological sites around the Wren's Nest locality

References

{{Reflist National nature reserves in England Local Nature Reserves in the West Midlands (county) Sites of Special Scientific Interest in the West Midlands (county) Scheduled monuments in the West Midlands (county) Dudley Geology of the West Midlands (county)