Kersal Moor - Geography

Geography

Kersal Moor is one of the many fluvioglacial ridges that formed along the Irwell Valley during the melting of the glaciers at the end of the last ice age. Typically for this type of landform, the subsoil is composed of sand mixed with coarse gravel. The 19th-century botanist Richard Buxton described this as "Mr. E.W. Binney's drift deposit no.2 ... a deposit of sharp forest sand, parted with layers of gravel composed of Azoic, Palaeozoic, and Triassic rocks, well rounded, parted with layers of fine sand, and having every appearance of a regular deposit by water." This deposit is overlaid with a thin topsoil supporting a range of mosses, heathers, grasses, ferns, common broom, gorse and some trees, which are predominately oak with some rowan, cherry and other broadleaved species. The land to the south is elevated, rising to a high point towards the south west. From this elevated position there are views across Manchester to the Derbyshire hills in the south, to the Pennines in the north east and across the Irwell Valley and Salford in the west. The land falls away to the north, ending with two drumlin-shaped hills on the northern edge, which were probably formed by sediment from the meltwater of the receding glaciers, in a process known as sedimentary fluting. The moor is criss-crossed with footpaths, many of which cut through to the sand and gravel below. Singleton Brook, to the north of the moor, denotes the boundary between Salford and Prestwich.