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    • Beacon Hill
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  • Not Quite Leicestershire
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  Leicestershire Bouldering
Pocketgate Quarry
Internationally significant (but not because of the climbing)

No climbing allowed: Pocketgate Quarry is a site of extreme scientific importance.

​In 1957, schoolboys climbing in the quarry found a strange fossil, the discovery of which changed science's view of when multicellular life first existed on Earth. The genus of the fossilised lifeform is named Charnia after Charnwood Forest. Leicestershire's favourite son, Sir David Attenborough, talks about the fossil at the start of the documentary below.


The quarry contains ancient rare fossils.  A concentric ring structure (Charniodiscus concentricus), the first Precambrian fossil, was discovered over a hundred years ago.  More recently (1959) a frond‑like structure was found.  They are thought to be some form of ancient seaweed.  The only other ones occur in Australia.  If you find them, leave them alone.  They have been there longer than you.
- Leicestershire Climbs (1993)
In April 1957, I went rock-climbing in Charnwood Forest with two friends, Richard Allen and Richard Blachford (‘Blach’), fellow students at Wyggeston Grammar School, Leicester. I was already interested in geology and knew that the rocks of the Charnian Supergroup were Precambrian although I had not heard of the Australian fossils. Richard Allen and I agree that Blach (who died in the early 1960s) drew my attention to the leaf-like fossil holotype now on display in Leicester City Museum. I took a rubbing and showed it to my father, who was Minister of the Great Meeting Unitarian Chapel in East Bond Street, taught part-time at University College (soon to be Leicester University) and thus knew Trevor Ford. We took Trevor to visit the fossil site and convinced him that it was a genuine fossil. His publication of the discovery in the Journal of the Yorkshire Geological Society established the genus Charnia and aroused worldwide interest
- Professor Roger Mason (2007)
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  • Home
  • Where To Visit First
  • Complete Crag Index
  • Map
  • ⠀
  • Crags By Area:
  • Bradgate Park
    • ⠀
    • Overview
    • ⠀
    • Sliding Stone Crag
    • Stable Pit
    • Wishing Stone Crag
    • Memorial Crag
  • Cademan Wood Area
    • ⠀
    • Overview
    • ⠀
    • Calvary Rock
    • Grace Dieu Boulder
    • Grimley's Rock
    • High Cademan
    • Hob's Hole
    • Pinnacle Crag
    • Poachers Rock
    • Swannymote Rock
    • Temple Hill
    • Trilobate Plantation
    • Turry Tor
    • Twentysteps
  • Markfield Area
    • ⠀
    • Altar Stones
    • Markfield Quarry
    • Old Rise Rocks
    • Old Wood
  • Mountsorrel Area
    • ⠀
    • Craig Buddon
    • Nunckley Quarry
    • Mountsorrel Crags
    • Mountsorrel Quarry
    • Rothley Brook Bridge
  • South Leicestershire
    • ⠀
    • Cosby Lodge Bridge
    • Croft Crags
    • Hockley Farm Bridge
    • Slawston Bridge
  • Whitwick Area
    • ⠀
    • Bardon Hill
    • Blackbrook Reservoir
    • Bomb Rocks
    • High Sharpley
    • High Tor
    • Ingleberry Rock
    • Ives Head
    • Morley Quarry
    • Oaks Pinnacle
    • Ratchet Hill
    • Timberwood Hill
    • Warren Hills
    • Whitwick Quarry
  • Woodhouse Eaves Area
    • ⠀
    • Beacon Hill
    • Benscliffe Wood
    • The Brand
    • Buck Hill
    • Forest Rock
    • Hangingstone Rocks
    • Not The Brand
    • The Outwoods
    • Pocketgate Quarry
    • Windmill Hill
  • ⠀
  • Not Quite Leicestershire
    • ⠀
    • Anchor Church Caves
    • Carver's Rocks
    • Finedon Slabs
    • Kettlebrook Bridge
    • Ticknall Lime Yards
    • ⠀
    • Warwickshire Climbs
  • ⠀
  • About
  • Acknowledgements
  • Contact
  • Bibliography