Bickershaw Wetland Enhancement

Bickershaw Country Park is a 247-hectare developing nature reserve located between Bickershaw village and Westleigh on the former Bickershaw Colliery site. It is a haven for wildlife and is comprised of extensive grasslands, woodlands, scrubland and a number of large water bodies.  In recent years, a partnership of the Environment Agency, Wigan Council and Lancashire Wildlife Trust has delivered an extensive programme of Natural Flood Management works on the site.   

The  long term ambition for the reserve is for it to become an informal recreation area, delivering high quality biodiversity and nature conservation through recreating and enhancing the naturally occurring and regionally important habitats as part of the wider wetland landscape. 

Historically, the sites hydrology had been modified for various purposes with drainage engineered to maintain drier conditions and enable water to flow off the site more quickly.  Recent work to reverse these modifications has allowed for more natural hydrology and longer water retention on site.  Despite these improvements a number of additional works are now required to further capture water to cope with the increased risk of storm events such as Storm Christoph in early 2021.   

The proposed works will also support key UK BAP species including the bittern as the site is of great importance as a stepping-stone between the population at Leighton Moss, and those on the East Coast in Yorkshire and East Anglia.  Great crested newt populations have decreased to two localised colonies as their habitat has dried out and rank vegetation has thrived and the works will help boost their population as well as support water vole recovery within the Wigan Borough and other key species including reed warbler, water rail and wildfowl.  

The current ditch network within the wetland will be converted back to streams and a network of ponds will be created along with reedbeds to improve water flows and link the habitats of Bickershaw and the wider sub-catchment. The network of re-established wetlands will provide a corridor from Nevison’s Flash at Plank Lane in the South to Diggle Flash at Smiths Lane in the North giving an area of approximately 180 ha of wetland centred on the area of Fir Tree Flash and its associated fen.  This wetland system running through the site will store water in times of peak flow and following storm events and will greatly increase the quality and amount of habitat available for wet grassland, wetland birds, water voles and great crested newts. 

The proposed wetland scheme will cost approximately £150,000 and achieve the following outcomes:  

• Nevison’s Flash will increase by 0.5 of a metre above the current storm event levels allowing the temporary storage of a further 14,0000 m3  of water during high rainfall periods.  

• The reedbed design should further slow the flow rate of water leaving the Bickershaw site and act as a sponge absorbing some of the water into the reed root mass.

• Mitigate future run off created through the Pennington Wharf development of housing in the Plank Lane area of Leighon the site of the former Bickershaw Colliery. 

• Improved habitat for bittern, water vole, great crested newt, MG8 wet grasslands orchids.  

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