Back in time at Crabtree Ponds

Our Community Ranger Rachel Stevenson has been investigating the history of this urban nature reserve.

The site of what is now Crabtree Ponds nature reserve was once the ornamental lake of a large Victorian mansion house. Crabtree Lodge was originally built in 1834 for a Mr. Rotherham and was a ‘substantial 3 storey property’. In 1858 and 1864 the house was extended by Mr Charles Atkinson JP. After his death, the house was sold in 1881 to Edward Tozer, of manufacturers Steel, Peach and Tozer, a huge steel works in the Don Valley. 

In sale documents Crabtree Lodge was described as having ‘spacious entrance hall, noble dining room, excellent drawing rooms, library and boudoir, lofty corridors, 11 bedrooms, pantries, kitchens, larders and every convenience for a family residence. There is a four-stall stable and coach-house and coachman’s room over, as well as a gardener’s cottage. The gardens were very tastefully laid out, being terraced up to the house, with an ornamental lake below, having a fountain in the centre. There is also a well-stocked and productive kitchen garden and 3½ acres of pastureland’. 

The house remained a private home until 1917 when there is evidence of it becoming a hotel or community building. After the end of the second world war in 1945 the house was empty and had fallen into disrepair. It was demolished in 1946 and the site was run by the Territorial Army who had a base at nearby Norbury Hall (now the Masjid Noor mosque).

In 1973 Sheffield Council acquired the whole area and built the Norbury Elderly People’s Home on the site of the old house and garden. The Elderly Peoples Home is currently due to be replaced by a housing development. The woods and ponds were an undesignated outdoor space until 1989, when Sheffield & Rotherham Wildlife Trust took over the management and created an urban nature reserve. The pond you see today is the original ornamental lake of Crabtree Lodge.

Wildlife at Crabtree Ponds

Crabtree Ponds is a real hidden gem. Mature woodlands and open water make it a perfect place to escape from the hustle and bustle of city life. Together with Roe Woods and Little Roe Woods – both ancient woodlands – it forms an important wildlife corridor and refuge for a wide variety of species. 

It is unusual to find such a large body of open water in a city. abundant with aquatic life such as rudd, roach, perch, crucian carp, sticklebacks and even eels. Several species of local biodiversity priorities, such as hawker dragonflies, smooth and palmate newt, frogs and toads can also be found here.

The dense shrub layer provides ideal habitat for fungi, shelter for hedgehogs and an ideal home for many insects.

Pipistrelle, Daubenton’s and Leisler’s bats all flit over from the nearby Roe Woods to feed at the ponds. In the woods where sycamore, poplar and ash predominate, bird boxes have encouraged nesting blue tits and great tits, with treecreepers, nuthatch, wrens also breeding here.

Your membership has helped to reduce invasive species and increase understorey planting of native woodland species such as hawthorn and hazel trees at this special site. Thanks to you, we have put up bird and bat boxes on the site and made a wildflower meadow area at the Barnsley Road entrance.