Whittlesey Mere

Holme Fen is a 269.4-hectare (666-acre) biological Site of Special Scientific Interest near Holme in Cambridgeshire. It is also a National Nature Reserve and a Nature Conservation Review site, Grade I. It is part of the Great Fen project, which aims to create a 3,700-hectare wetland wildlife area including Holme Fen, Woodwalton Fen and other areas. It is home to a variety of birds, including the Eurasian siskin, Nightingale and Lesser redpoll, and around 450 species of fungi.Holme Fen is described by Natural England as the finest example of birch woodland in lowland Britain. Part of it was a mere which was drained in the nineteenth century, and some relict wetland plants survive such as saw sedge and fen wood-rush. Two new lakes have been excavated.Holme Fen, specifically Holme Posts, is believed to be the lowest land point in Great Britain at 2.75 metres (9.0 ft) below sea level.

The Fens or Fenlands in eastern England are a naturally marshy region supporting a rich ecology and numerous species. Most of the fens were drained centuries ago, resulting in a flat, dry, low-lying agricultural region supported by a system of drainage channels and man-made rivers (dykes and drains) and automated pumping stations. There have been unintended consequences to this reclamation, as the land level has continued to sink and the dykes have been built higher to protect it from flooding. Fen is the local term for an individual area of marshland or former marshland. It also designates the type of marsh typical of the area, which has neutral or alkaline water and relatively large quantities of dissolved minerals, but few other plant nutrients. The Fens are a National Character Area, based on their landscape, biodiversity, geodiversity and economic activity. The Fens lie inland of the Wash, and are an area of nearly 1,500 sq mi (3,900 km2) in the south east of Lincolnshire, most of Cambridgeshire, and western most parts of Norfolk and Suffolk.Most of the Fens lie within a few metres of sea level. As with similar areas in the Netherlands, much of the Fenland originally consisted of fresh- or salt-water wetlands. These have been artificially drained and continue to be protected from floods by drainage banks and pumps. With the support of this drainage system, the Fenland has become a major arable agricultural region for grains and vegetables. The Fens are particularly fertile, containing around half of the grade 1 agricultural land in England.The Fens have been referred to as the "Holy Land of the English" because of the former monasteries, now churches and cathedrals, of Crowland, Ely, Peterborough, Ramsey and Thorney. Other significant settlements in the Fens include Boston, Downham Market, Mildenhall, March, Spalding, and Wisbech.

The Great Fen is a habitat restoration project being undertaken on The Fens in the county of Cambridgeshire in England. It is one of the largest restoration projects in the country, and aims to create a 3,700 hectare wetland and aims to connect Woodwalton Fen National Nature Reserve (NNR), Holme Fen NNR and other nature reserves to create a larger site with conservation benefits for wildlife and socio-economic benefits for people. This is a long-term project managed in partnership by the Environment Agency, Huntingdonshire District Council, Middle Level Commissioners, Natural England and the Wildlife Trust for Bedfordshire, Cambridgeshire and Northamptonshire (WTBCN). Woodwalton Fen, Holme Fen and Darlows Farm are managed by Natural England, while the WTBCN manages the Countryside Centre for educational and community work, together with Corney's Farm, New Decoy Farm, Old Decoy Farm, Engine Farm, Rymes Reedbeds (which has a bird hide), and Kesters Docking.

Holme railway station is a former station in Holme, Cambridgeshire.

The Admiral Wells is a public house in Holme, Huntingdonshire, now in Cambridgeshire. Nearby Holme Fen is 2.75 metres (9.0 feet) below sea level, and the Admiral Wells claims to be the lowest pub in Great Britain. However, large-scale maps show the pub itself is approximately 4 metres above sea level, so this claim appears to be incorrect.

Yaxley and Farcet railway station is a former station in Yaxley, Cambridgeshire, just south of Peterborough.

Farcet is a village and civil parish in Cambridgeshire, England. Farcet lies approximately 2 miles (3 km) south of Peterborough city centre, between Yaxley and the Peterborough suburb of Old Fletton. Farcet is situated within Huntingdonshire which is a non-metropolitan district of Cambridgeshire as well as being a historic county of England.The parish of Farcet was established in 1851, having previously been part of the parish of Stanground, its northern neighbour, when the vicarage of Stanground included the curacy of Farcet's village church.

The Battle of the Holme took place in East Anglia on 13 December 902 where the Anglo-Saxon men of Wessex and Kent fought against the Danelaw and East Anglian Danes. Its location is unknown but may have been Holme in Huntingdonshire (now administratively part of Cambridgeshire).Following the death of Alfred the Great in 899, his son Edward the Elder became king, but his cousin Æthelwold, the son of Alfred's elder brother, King Æthelred, claimed the throne. His bid was unsuccessful, and he fled to the Northumbrian Danes, who, according to one version of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, accepted him as king. In 902 Æthelwold came with a fleet to Essex and the following year he persuaded the East Anglian Danes to attack Mercia and north Wessex. Edward retaliated by ravaging East Anglia and the Danish army was forced to return to defend its own territory. Edward then retreated, but the men of Kent disobeyed the order to retire, and they met the Danes at the battle of the Holme. The course of the battle is unknown, but the Danes appear to have won as according to the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle they "kept the place of slaughter". However, they suffered heavy losses including Æthelwold, Eohric, probably the Danish king of East Anglia, Brihtsige, son of the ætheling Beornoth, and two holds, Ysopa and Oscetel. The battle thus ended Æthelwold's Revolt. Kentish losses included Sigehelm, father of Edward the Elder's third wife, Eadgifu of Kent. The West Saxon chronicler who gave the fullest account of the battle was at pains to explain why Edward and the rest of the English were not present, as if this had been a subject of criticism.

Holme is a village and civil parish in Cambridgeshire, England. Holme lies approximately 7 miles (11 km) south of Peterborough, near Conington and Yaxley. Holme is situated within Huntingdonshire which is a non-metropolitan district of Cambridgeshire as well as being a historic county of England. The parish contains the lowest point in Great Britain, 2.75 metres (9.0 ft) below sea level.

Ramsey St Mary's is a village in Ramsey civil parish, part of the Huntingdonshire district of Cambridgeshire, England.

Stanground Academy is a co-educational academy school and specialist college for sport, in the city of Peterborough in the United Kingdom. It has capacity for around 1,800 students. The school was established in 1966 as Stanground Secondary Modern School, becoming comprehensive when education in the county was reorganised in 1976. It was officially opened by Alderman Dr. Jack Hunt, chairman of the Education Committee of the then Huntingdon and Peterborough County Council, after whom another local school is named.It has had specialist status as a sports college since 2001 and in 2012, it became an academy when it was handed over by Peterborough City Council to the Greenwood Dale Foundation Trust in order to improve the school as it was remarkably behind the national average in most aspects of education and learning. Stanground Academy was finally rebuilt in September 2013 with the original school making way for demolition. This was beneficial in terms of the facilities available to students at the school, and has also solved the many maintenance issues with the former building which had led to the school being closed to students on several occasions in the past due to dangerous conditions for a communal building.Facilities at the school include a pool open for public swimming and a fitness suite/gym which is also open to the public during term time as well as in the half term breaks. Most students are of British or Italian heritage and the majority have English as their first language. However, an increasing number of students are joining the academy having recently arrived in the United Kingdom. Over 15% of students are now from Eastern Europe and many speak little or no English. The proportion of students with learning difficulties or disabilities is above the national average and the economic backgrounds of students are broadly in line with the national average.In conjunction to this, the last Ofsted report filed the school as "good". It has recently claimed to be one of the most improved schools in the United Kingdom.

The Middle Level Navigations are a network of waterways in England, primarily used for land drainage, which lie in The Fens between the Rivers Nene and Great Ouse, and between the cities of Peterborough and Cambridge. Most of the area through which they run is at or below sea level, and attempts to protect it from inundation have been carried out since 1480. The Middle Level was given its name by the Dutch Engineer Cornelius Vermuyden in 1642, who subsequently constructed several drainage channels to make the area suitable for agriculture. Water levels were always managed to allow navigation, and Commissioners were established in 1754 to maintain the waterways and collect tolls from commercial traffic. The Middle Level Main Drain to Wiggenhall St Germans was completed in 1848, which provided better drainage because the outfall was lower than that at Salters Lode. Whittlesey Mere, the last remaining lake, was drained soon afterwards, using one of the first applications of John Appold's centrifugal pump, following its appearance at the Great Exhibition in 1851. Traffic on the network began to diminish after the opening of the railway through March in 1846, and fell dramatically in the early twentieth century. The last regular commercial traffic was the tanker barge Shellfen, which delivered fuel oil to pumping stations until 1971. As a result of the drainage, land levels continued to fall, and in 1934 the gravity outfall at Wiggenhall St Germans was replaced by a pumping station, with three diesel engines driving 8 ft 6 in (2.6 m) diameter pumps. Its capacity was increased in 1951, and again in 1969–70, when two of the engines were replaced by electric motors. Following over 50 hours of continuous running at maximum capacity in 1998, a new pumping station was commissioned. Work on it began in 2006, and when it was completed in 2010, it was the second largest pumping station in Europe. Much of the drainage of the Middle Levels relies on pumping, and the Commissioners manage over 100 pumping stations throughout the area. Interest in restoration of the Middle Levels for leisure traffic began in 1949, and the first significant work by volunteers occurred in 1972, when they worked on the restoration of Well Creek, which finally reopened in 1975. Since then, locks have been lengthened, to allow access by modern narrowboats, as they were built for Fen Lighters, which were only 49 feet (15 m) long. The southern reaches became more accessible in 2006, when a low Bailey bridge was raised by soldiers from the 39 Engineer Regiment. The system is managed by Commissioners, and they are the fourth largest navigation authority in Great Britain.