With this nod to the book upon which ‘Game of Thrones’ is based, happy 40 birthday to the Black Country Geological Society. I was privileged to be at the celebrations earlier this month at Dudley Museum and Art Gallery.

The natural history of any area is a direct reflection of its geology, which includes the topography, underlying rocks, and the soils derived both from those rocks and other materials deposited by rivers, ancient glaciers, earthquakes and volcanoes.

The Black Country has the most complex geology for its area of almost anywhere in the world.

The natural vegetation varies accordingly, limestone loving plants like common century, ash and hazel, do well in parts of Walsall and Dudley, others, such as heather, birch and oaks, are happier on more acid soils. Below the surface the rocks and deposits profoundly influence human activities.

The Black Country was a centre of the Industrial Revolution because of the easy availability of coal, ironstone, limestone, sands and gravels, and hard rock in places like the Rowley Hills. At the same time there was plenty of fertile farmland on the overlying neutral, richer, soils.

In Victorian times geologists came from far and wide to study here. There was a local geological society then, but it did not survive into the 20th Century.

The Dudley Bug fossil found in lime in Dudley.
The Dudley Bug fossil found in lime in Dudley.

In 1975 a group of local geologists got together to found the Society we now have. Many of them are still involved today combining knowledge, enthusiasm and dedication.

The Black Country Geological Society is the epitome of an amateur scientific society. The word ‘amateur’ is derived from ‘amore’, love: those involved love their subject and willingly undertake the effort needed to master it.

The members mix learned discourse with social activities, original research and outreach to local communities.

The Society’s expertise is evidenced by the leaflets and other material they have produced on the geology of the Black Country towns, its millions of years of history, the fossils (including the famous ‘Dudley Bug’) and its continuing relevance to nature and our everyday lives.

The leaflets reveal the scorching deserts and icy wastes, coral seas and carboniferous forests, which once covered the land, as well as the dinosaurs, woolly mammoths, hippopotami and other creatures which once lived here.

Happy birthday indeed.

Find out more at www.bcgs.info

Twitter: @PeteWestbrom