Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
FIG
21.
Pennard Castle, a site 'besanded' during the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. (Harold Grenfell)
Records, including further Acts of Parliament concerned with coastal protection, show that the stormy
conditions and subsequent drifting of sand continued until the eighteenth century.
SOILS
Soil formation in Britain began as the ice cover diminished, and it is continuing today. An earlier origin
hasbeenproposedfortheredclay-rich material that lies ontopoftheGowerlimestone, butinmostcases
this appears to have been produced by glacial 'smearing', or by solifluction. The soils (Table 6) broadly
reflectthedistributionoftheunderlyinggeologyofCarboniferousLimestone,MillstoneGritandtheCoal
Measures, but are more locally influenced by a covering of glacial, or periglacial, deposits. South and
westGoweriscoveredwithgravelyloams,whilefiner-texturedsoiliswidespreadinthenortheast.Brown
earthsarethemainsoilsinthecomplextillandglaciofluvial depositsthatoccurinsouthandwestGower.
These soils, which cover most of the peninsula, are agriculturally important and are deep and loamy with
rounded stones throughout the soil profile. Although they are derived from relatively acidic Carbonifer-
ousrocks,withapHofaround5.0,theiracidityhasbeenloweredbytheapplicationoflime'manure'and
basic slag.
It was a common practice for Gower farmers to mix lime with proportions of earth to produce what
was termed 'marl'. Lime making was one of the earliest industrial activities in the peninsula, the material
being produced by heating limestone in kilns and then treating it with water to form calcium hydroxide.
The Oxwich jurors wrote in 1632 that it was their right 'to digge lime-stones for to repaire … and to burn
lime', while at Landimore in 1639 it was recorded that 'there be Quarries of Limestones where Tenants
time out of mind have used to burn their Lime for the composting of their lands'. Most of the surviving
limekilns were constructed largely in the period between 1750 and 1850 to burn limestone in order to
