A proposal to extend opencast mining at Nant Helen Colliery, South Wales, threatened both archaeological sites and a large expanse of upland mire on Mynydd y Drum. Excavations of two cairns and a length of post-medieval trackway were conducted there by the Clwyd-Powys Archaeological Trust in the summer of 1987. These were accompanied by palaeoecological work to ascertain both the post-glacial environmental history of Mynydd y Drum and the contemporary environmental setting of the two cairns. Evidence suggests that the most dramatic impact upon local woodland was in the early Bronze Age. The evidence for former extensive deciduous woodlands on Mynydd y Drum now offers British Coal a wider range of land restoration goals, for consideration when the opencast mining ceases. -from Author
