Protected area in Berkshire, England
Cold Ash Quarry is a 0.4-hectare (0.99-acre) geological Site of Special Scientific Interest north of Newbury in Berkshire.[1][2] It is a Geological Conservation Review site.[3][4]
The quarry is unique in Britain for the collection of fossil plants and insects which occur in a layer of silt and clay within the Reading Beds. The fossils date to about 60 million years ago. The fossil flora consists of well-preserved angiosperm leaves, in some of these fossils there is evidence of the activity of contemporary leaf-miner insects. This is the only location in Britain at which fossil leaf-miner activity have been discovered.[5]
The site is private land with no public access.
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