River Ock
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
- See also the River Ock, Surrey.
The River Ock is a small English river or brook. It has as its catchment area the Vale of White Horse, a low-lying and wide hanging valley in South Oxfordshire. It arises near the village of Little Coxwell and flows into the River Thames, at Abingdon (by the old Hygienic Laundry building), where an old iron bridge marks its passage. It collects tributaries from each village along the base of the White Horse Hills, where springs emanating from the chalk hills allowed settlements to flourish in former times.
From Little Coxwell, it runs around Longcot and flows past Stanford in the Vale, where it is about ten feet (three metres) wide. The name of Stanford comes from Stony Ford, possibly alluding to the Ock crossing at Stanford Mill. Thence it runs past Charney Bassett, Lyford, Garford and Marcham Mill, before losing its identity and its waters to the Thames at Abingdon.
The soils through which it flows are the Jurassic sedimentary series (Greensands, Gault, Kimmeridge Clay and corallian limestone), while some of its tributaries arise in chalk springs. Until recent times, native crayfish and many freshwater fish species inhabited the river. Increased housing in the Vale, with the resultant surface drainage, may have threatened these species but surveys have not yet been performed in the 21st Century.
Although normally placid, the Ock can flood low-lying areas of south Abingdon after persistent heavy rainfall; this last occurred in July 2007.
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