Dabchick antics enliven a futile vole quest

Cromford, Derbyshire The towpath is popular with Derbyshire folk making their version of the passeggiata, often with dogs, and the water vole is easily spooked

William Jessop was a generous man, always ready to give a fellow engineer a leg up. Building the Cromford canal, in the Derbyshire Dales, he hired Benjamin Outram, the son of a local investor, as his assistant. Their great work terminates at Cromford Wharf, once a harbinger of the industrial revolution, now dozing in the evening sunshine, its crumbling stonework the colour of honey.

The northern section of the canal, five miles from the wharf to Ambergate, is a site of special scientific interest, noted for being a last redoubt for water voles, a change of use I doubt Jessop could have foreseen.