Dean, C. 2026. Resurrecting Suffolk’s Ghost Ponds. in: Living Heritage in a Changing World: Cultural Landscapes and Intangible Heritage in the Face of Climate Challenge Spain The Andalusian Institute of Historical Heritage (Instituto Andaluz del Patrimonio Histórico, IAPH).
| Chapter title | Resurrecting Suffolk’s Ghost Ponds |
|---|---|
| Authors | Dean, C. |
| Abstract | My paper discusses the adaption of Suffolk’s (UK) rural landscape through the recolonisation of resurrected ‘Ghost Ponds’, previously infilled due to agricultural consolidation, (Alderton et All). Infilling ponds was typical of 19th c farming and later agricultural policies. I will address the consequences of this practice in relation to systematic thinking, and how this has affected the wider ecological status of the area. Tsing’s attention to feral geographies and patchy Anthropocene’s, disrupted by human infrastructures, is a good start for framing my research into Ghost Ponds. I argue that these historical ponds, filled in because of modern farming practice and now rediscovered ‘represent abundant, dormant time capsules for aquatic species in agricultural landscapes (in the UK) around the globe, affording opportunities for enhancing landscape-scale aquatic biodiversity and connectivity” (Sayer, 2017). Recent research has revealed that despite the loss of wetlands due to this agricultural intensification, which possess a major threat to aquatic biodiversity, propagules of some aquatic species can survive in the burial under agricultural fields in the sediments of ‘ghost ponds. Suffolk’s historical ponds, colloquially know as horse ponds, have been represented in paintings most famously by John Constable, with his often-reproduced painting, Hay Wain, (1821) which depicts a rural scene of a Suffolk mill stream which feeds rivulets. Constable was also a keen meteorologist creating cloud studies. My questions will raise what the significance of ‘Recovering the lost history of these sites’ which give residents the opportunity to care for their environment |
| Keywords | cultural climatology |
| Book title | Living Heritage in a Changing World: Cultural Landscapes and Intangible Heritage in the Face of Climate Challenge |
| Year | 2026 |
| Publisher | The Andalusian Institute of Historical Heritage (Instituto Andaluz del Patrimonio Histórico, IAPH) |
| Publication dates | |
| Published | 01 Sep 2026 |
| Place of publication | Spain |