The Quaker’s Hole Community Wetland Project was originally conceived in 2003. As an undertaking designed to investigate, manage and enhance the wetlands whilst involivng all facets of the local community, it has been hugely succesfull. Upcoming events and improvements can only improve upon this success.

Occupying a site of approximately 9 hectares near to Whitley Chapel, the land is owned by Hexhamshire Parish Council, Dilston College and 2 private landowners whose common objective is to protect and enhance a nationally rare wetland area by embedding the project within the local community. Any enhancement has been designed wherever possible to become part of the community and create a long term asset for all, with minimum long term liabilities. To achieve this, “buy in” from the community has been critical and as can be seen on the Projects page, already much enjoyment, fun and learning has been attained from a very exciting environmental and wildlife project.

The name Quaker’s Hole, (or Quaker’s Hollow), is likely derived from the fact that the members of the Society of Friends, (Quakers), in the late 1600s, held meetings on Chapel Hill to the North of this site where St Helen’s Church now stands. Looking down from this hill the land forms a natural hollow.

The banks and fields surrounding the site lie on boulder clay, sand and gravel, but the wet ground in Quaker’s Hole is made of peat, (the rotten remains of plants that have built up over thousands of years). This peat acts like a giant sponge holding moisture in the ground and ensuring wet conditions all year round for the specially adapted plants and animals that can be found here.

The site can be classified as a soligenous mire, the wetness of the ground being maintained by a slow lateral movement of water through the peat. All the water flowing through and across Quaker’s Hole eventually meets a stream flowing eastwards into the Devil’s Water.