Talk:Bowerchalke
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[edit] Geology
I hesitate to be critical as we could do with more geology in UK articles, and this one is very interesting, but there is an important omission, and I'd find it hard to keep my grubby mits from taking the garden shears to the rest in adding it. Before I wade in, what do others think? Here are my niggles:
- The geology section is surely too long for a small village. A great deal of it would seem to be more appropriate as part of the missing Geology of Wiltshire article. In particular the pre-Pleistocene history of Bowerchalke does not differ significantly from other parts of southern England. The place to describe how chalk was formed (for example) is surely in Upper Cretaceous, Chalk, Chalk Formation, Southern England Chalk Formation, etc, not in an article about one of the thousands of villages that (in this case don't even) sit on it.
- What is significant (but not mentioned) about the geology here is that there is a faultline running up the valley with a downthrow to the north, and to the south of this is an anticline running through Bowerchalke. It is the eroded core of the anticline that contains the inlier.
- Clay with flints: It is confusing to say the 'flints were formed in multiple layers as the clay sediment built up': the meaning is presumably that the layers were formed, not the flints, which are eroded out of the chalk (where they formed by precipitation from silica-rich groundwater, probably due to meeting a pocket of more acid conditions). Clay with flints itself is generally regarded as representing the insoluble residue concentrated out of dissolved chalk and/or solifluction debris derived from post-Cretaceous sediments.
- Unique? Well is it or isn't it? "The main portion of the village is formed on the unique 'Bowerchalke greensand inlier'" (Geology para 3), vs "The closest 'unique greensand inlier' is near Andover in Hampshire." (geology end of para 4). There are at least 2 other Greensand inliers not terribly far away, at Shalbourne (south of Hungerford), and north of Watership Down (probably what is meant by near Andover). The Greensand ridge in the heart of the latter is very striking - see Isle Hill to the east of Sydmonton Court: grid reference SU500582.
- No references given for the geology - where is all this from?
Pterre (talk) 15:31, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
- Unique? ... and unique ... and another unique ... my miserable attempt to lighten the mood of any harmless drudge who was prepared to trawl through the section. I suspect just two of us in 2 years. But with a 50% failure rate it should be corrected. I have visited Isle Hill and agree with you verdict. Autodidactyl (talk) 16:39, 30 May 2008 (UTC)
- There is no reason why you shouldn't edit it, grubby or not. Ideally adding the fault line, eroded anticline, flints stuff to correct it, before shearing it off and using as a germ for the Geology of Wiltshire. Your understanding and sources are obviously considerable. I drafted most of it because there was no G of W article to read, and in the hope that the parochial view and animated terminology may help to bring geology to life. Autodidactyl (talk) 17:10, 30 May 2008 (UTC)
