NWT Thompson Common

Famous for its pingos, a series of 300 or so shallow pools with a dazzling array of water plants. One of the most important sites in Europe for water beetles and in the UK for dragonflies.

What to look for: Spring/summer water violet, marestail, marsh pennywort, fen pondweed, bogbean, marsh orchid, marsh cinquefoil, heather, quaking grass, salad burnet, dwarf thistle. Scarce emerald, hairy and emperor dragonfly.

Facilities: The Great Eastern Pingo Trail, an 8-mile circular walk around the pingos. Information board. Reserve leaflet.

Directions: NWT Thompson Common is 6 km south of Watton. Leave Watton on the A1075 to Thetford road. Just before Stow Bedon, look for the Great Eastern Pingo Trail car park located behind the lay-by as the road bends to the left.

Access: Entrance is from the car park via a kissing gate.

Management aims: We care for the pingos by clearing surrounding scrub and woodland, maintain a mixture of open water, fen, grassland, woodland,heath and scrub and graze open areas with ponies and sheep.

Did you know? The pingos here were formed about 9,000 years ago during semi-frozen conditions at the end of the last ice age. NWT Thompson Common is one of the best-preserved pingo sites in Britain.