Balade de l’Abbé Legrain

L’Escaille nature reserve lies 600 metres from Gembloux, along the N4. In the 1960s, several dozen hectares of settling pits belonging to the Gembloux sugar refinery attracted an abundant and wide variety of avifauna. When they migrated, the birds stopped off at this nesting site. However, when these settling pits were converted into agricultural land, the birds became only occasional visitors. This was why, in 1987, five hectares were transformed into a protected zone. Over the past few years, this Natagora reserve has become an important conservation area for species of plants, fungus, lichens, moss, algae, snails and slugs, insects, fish, batrachians, reptiles, mammals and birds. In addition, the site is dotted with remains telling the story of a rich past. Near the lakes lie the ruins of the hydraulic mill belonging to the old 18th-century Benedictine abbey, the water settling pits of the old sugar refinery and a model made of plants, depicting the reserve in 3D.