Cowbit wash

In the day before pumping engines the washes protected the local settlements from flooding. Cowbit (pronounces Cubbit) Wash lies to the west of the village, extends 8 miles from north to south, and is nearly 1 mile broad. Mainly arable land, it is a flood plain for the navigable River Welland, separated from Cowbit by an earth bank, Barrier Bank. Previously Welland overflow regularly flooded the Wash, the water freezing-over during winter allowing for ice skating and skating championships. A relief channel (Coronation Channel) for the Welland at Spalding made Cowbit Wash obsolete as a flood plain after the 1950s. The channel was built after the floods of 1947 which featured on Pathé news. The land is now drained by several pumping stations. Even the retired Pinchbeck pumping engine pumped 7,500 gallons per minute!