YOU can't wander far in South Cumbria before coming across limestone country - and evidence of its use by farmers, builders and industrialists. Limestone formation and its many uses featured in a talk by former Bury GP Peter Standing at a conference on the industries of South Westmorland.

He was speaking at an event held at Preston Patrick Memorial Hall, near Crooklands, by the Cumbria Industrial History Society.

Limestone was formed from dead sea creatures when what is now the British Isles was south of the Equator up to 340m years ago.

The distinctive layers of limestone have been given local names by geologists - Dalton, Park and Urswick.

The rock was later shaped by glaciers and in Cumbria began to emerge from the ice around 19,000 years ago.

Frost made scree and chemical weather by acid rain, or carbonic acid, created caves and distinctive surface features called clints and grikes.

These very decorative pieces of shaped stone proved extremely popular with Victorian house builders and can be seen as gate posts and wall tops in places such as Ulverston, Kendal and Carnforth.

He said: "Urswick limestone in particular is very good for making gate posts and lintels for buildings or for bridges."

This decorative "limestone pavement" only started to get legal protection in the 1981 - the first order to prevent removal being at Hampsfell, near Grange.

There is evidence of humans making use of caves near Grange up to 10,000 years ago and other limestone holes were used for burials or dumping waste in Roman times and the medieval era.

Medieval builders of churches and defensive towers used limestone and farmers cleared loose pieces of the rock from fields to form walls or cairns.

From the mid-18th century lime kilns were being built to burn the stone to create lime to improve the land for agriculture.

The kilns can still be seen at the sides of roads, or the corners of fields, at places such as The Green, near Millom, the centre of Greenodd, or at Humphrey Head, near Grange.

There is a double kiln at Sandside, close to the railway and a major limestone quarry, near Arnside.

Dr Standing said: "Most of these major quarries were linked to a railway line. "The railways were crucial in developing the quarries."

The Grange-based New Northern Quarries operated Trowbarrow Quarry at Silverdale and produced Quarrite for road laying.

Scout Cragg Quarry at Warton was served by a branch line to the carnforth Ironworks.

It provided limestone as a flux in the iron furnaces - as did quarries such as Greenscoe, near Askam, Redhills Quarry at Millom and Stainton Quarry, near Urswick.

Today only a couple of limestone quarries are active with the others given new uses as caravan parks, diving centres or wildlife reserves.