The Rother Valley

The valley of the western Rother lies within the South Downs National Park but has a special character based on its Cretaceous geology of sandstones and clays. These give rise to soils that are ideal for agriculture but are extremely erodible. Over the centuries the area has been exploited by humans and partially cleared of forest. In this book, the archaeological history of the Rother Valley is summarized, with particular emphasis on the evidence for Mesolithic, Bronze Age and Roman occupation. Analysis of sediments in ponds adds to the evidence for changes that have happened over the last few hundred years. A notable feature of the cultural landscape is the network of sunken lanes.

The Rother Valley contains unique chalk-aquifer fed streams with rare and protected species, such as sea trout and otter. Heathland, floodplain, wet meadows and woodlands are interspersed with agriculture, linked together by hedgerows and ditches. The health of the river is threatened by polluting inputs from farming and sewage. Past weather and hydrological records show the potential impact of climate change on the functioning of the river. The impact of recent changes on water availability for irrigation and human consumption are explored in relation to ecosystem requirements. Soil erosion is a significant problem, with the resulting high river sediment concentrations requiring expensive cleaning for the water to be fit for human consumption and the runoff often causes flooding of roads and properties. Mitigation measures aim to reduce the loss of soil on fields and interrupt connectivity between fields and the river system. We identify sediment sources contributing eroded soil to the river, the function of field-edge sediment traps, in-stream weirs and major reservoirs on sediment storage and connectivity.

Finally, the book considers the future of the unique landscape that is the Rother Valley, including plans for restoration of the flood plain. Contributors include planners, researchers and managers of the large estates that are an integral part of the Rother landscape.

Table of Contents

1. Introduction
John Boardman, Ian Foster and Nick Heasman
2. Landscape Archaeology of the Western Rother Valley
Martin Bell
3. Sunken Lanes
John Boardman
4. Ecology of the Western Rother Valley
Sandra Manning-Jones, Andy Thomas and Ruth Copeland-Phillips
5. The Palaeoecology of the Western Rother Valley
Sarah Thoma
6. The Climate and Hydrology of the Rother Valley
Ruth Copeland-Phillips and Tim Burt
7. Soil erosion and mitigation measures in the Rother valley
John Boardman and David Favis-Mortlock
8. The river Rother; a long history of change and human interference
Ian Foster, John Boardman, Adrian Collins, Ruth Copeland-Phillips, Jennine Evans and Atish Vadher
9. Rewilding and Reconnecting the Floodplain to the River
Jenny Collins
10. The Future of the Rother and its Catchment
Ian Foster and John Boardman

John Boardman is a geomorphologist educated at the Universities of Keele (BA and DSc) and London (BSc, PhD, PGCE). John retired from the Environmental Change Institute (ECI) at the University of Oxford, in September 2008. He is now an Emeritus Professor at the ECI, and at the University of the Free State, South Africa. He has published over 190 papers mainly on land degradation and has edited several books including Soil Erosion in Europe (2006) and Southern African Landscapes and Environmental Change (2018). John continues to work on soil erosion in southern England and on land degradation in South Africa.