Catcliffe Flash
Catcliffe Flash is a Local Nature Reserve much beloved by bird watchers and accessible just off the B6067. Its name does not appear on any of my maps and I have been able to find little out about the origins of the pond alongside the river though the name 'Mill House' leads me to believe that it was originally a mill pond. I have now found out that the Flash has been created gradually during the 20th Century by subsidence. Around the Flash is an area of well-developed marshland and willow carr. Beyond the carr, grassland stretches along the river Rother.
In the 19th Century the area that is now Catcliffe Flash was a number of fields divided by dykes, with the mill goit running through it and all surrounded by floodbanks as it was low lying and liable to flood. There was later a cricket field and pavilion there.
However between 1900 and 1980 eight different coal seams were mined under the area. As each successive seam was mined the ground level subsided a little more until a total of approximately 7 metres sunk in the north and 5 metres sunk in the south. Part of the site was used for tipping waste from the steel industry prior to 1976. The land was bought by South Yorkshire County Council in 1976 after tipping ceased there and was established as a nature reserve. It passed to Rotherham Council when SYCC was broken up. It was given the official designation of a Local Nature Reserve in 1993.
The flash is approximately a metre/metre and a half deep and covers about 12 hectares. It forms part of the washlands of the River Rother and the area can be subject to rapid flooding during heavy rains. The day we visited the presence of an incredibly large number of rats who infested the bank along Treeton Lane was somewhat disturbing. Other than that there were a dozen or so species of waterfowl easily identifiable without the use of binoculars and probably loads more. The drying out of the southern part of the marshlands has resulted in a change in the numbers and types of birds using the Flash.
I understand that there are plans afoot or in this case more aptly afloat to designate other stretches of the River Rother as wildlife protected areas and somebody has told me, though I have not confirmed this with authority, that this will include the oxbow and the marshes of Blue Man's Bower.