Return of century old tradition

Prestwood Nature started in December 2007 and the support of Chilterns Conservation Board, Great Missenden Parish Council, Great Missenden and Prestwood Revitalisation Group, the Bucks Foundation, Bucks County Council and private donors has enabled the work to be completed.
The pond was used in the 18th and 19th centuries for washing sheep being taken to market along the old drove road by Prestwood Common. Washing improved their fur to make them more saleable. After it was last used it was not maintained and gradually silted up with leaf-mould and became a cold dark swamp with little life, so obscured by scrub and trees that even many local residents failed to realise it was there.
Prestwood Nature took out some of the over-shadowing trees and then used a machine to dig the pond out to its original depth of ten feet. More than 1000 aquatic plants were put in by volunteers, and these became established over the summer of 2008, while others returned naturally from seeds buried in the mud. As early as March 2008 frogs had spawned in the pond and much other wildlife, such as newts, dragonflies and water-bugs began to colonise the water. In autumn 2008 work started on a dipping platform and a path leading to the safer shallow end of the pond.