Lode Apron

The Lode Apron forms a southwest-northeast aligned swathe of land between the Cam Valley, the Fen Edge and the Balsham Chalk Uplands. The elevation is typically in the range 5 to 20m OD and the clay-rich soils are often poorly drained. There are patches of Terrace Deposits and palaeochannels filled by Holocene Peat.

It is underlain by Gault Clay & West Melbury Marly Chalk, and the thin Cambridge Greensand at their junction was worked for coprolites by open-cast mining in the late 19th Century.

There are no geological SSSI and four LGS, Coldham’s Common in Cambridge, The Hythe at Reach and two Chalk pits in Reach.