Bird Watching at Adel Dam

The second outing I organised for #LUUBRS - our student nature recording group - was a bird watching session at Adel Dam nature reserve in Leeds. This was planned in the run up to the RSPB's big garden bird count which is taking place at the end of January, to enable people to get some practice and support with identification skills before the big day.  The trip also provided the opportunity for me to try out my new camera lens, providing extra zoom on my DSLR.

An elite group of three of us turned out on a very cold winter's day, the freshly fallen snow making for a very picturesque scene. Our first stop was the meeting point at the underpass near the car park. Several ducks had congregated by the bridge, and a robin and nuthatch teased us through the branches of a fir tree.

Moving through the park, we stopped at the main lake in Golden Acre Park. This held a congregation of ducks and geese. The black-headed gulls had us confused - in their winter plumage they do not have black heads! - but were figured it out and were soon also able to identify first wintering juveniles. There was a thin layer of ice at the far side of the lake, and a pair of mute swans were valiantly trying to battle through.

We were confused by a couple of ducks that didn't seem to be any particular species - further research revealed them to be what is colloquially known as "manky mallards" - hybrids that display a variety of colours and patterns (http://10000birds.com/manky-mallards-domestic-feral-or-just-plain-odd-mallards.htm). One of those seen was almost black (see photo above right), another white with pale brown patches, and a third that looked very much like a male mallard but had a large white bib.

Next, we moved into Adel Dam Nature Reserve. There was little to see in the woodland, and it became clear when we entered Marsh Hide that this was because all of the birds were congregating around the bird feeders and making the most of the snacks provided. We spent some time here looking at the different species. Small and cheeky coal tits are a bird I rarely see, but they were here in abundance competing with the more common blue and great tits. A great spotted woodpecker visited the bird feeder, taking his time to feast on the peanuts; a gaggle of colourful mandarin ducks made their way from the stream into the marsh; and a colourful Jay put in several appearances.

On our way to the next hide we saw movement in the trees and identified a tree creeper, aptly named for its behaviour of creeping acrobatically up tree trunks, its vivid white chest clearly visible.

Lake Hide provided much of the same including nuthatches and tits feeding, but here we also had open view across the lake. A grey heron worked its way slowly across the lake, and a sparrowhawk passed by overhead. We took some time to talk to the friendly volunteers, kindly giving up their time to educate novices like ourselves, and obviously passionate about the nature reserve they help with.

The volunteers from Adel Dam Nature Reserve were friendly and helpful during their 'guide in the hide' session: they have a wonderful area to work in.

We managed to log 24 species during the visit, and I think we all learnt something new. I'm looking forward to a repeat visit this weekend when we will hopefully see a few more new species.

New Year Plant Hunt 2016

This year I again took part in the BSBI's New Year flowering plant hunt. I organised a trip to Adel Dam nature reserve for members of the proposed new University of Leeds union society for biological recording #LUUBRS. Due to the restrictions of the event running over the first four days in January, most students were home for the holidays so just a couple of us turned up on the day. Discounting plants in the parkland, there were few flowering plants found in the woodland. This was perhaps a mistake of mine in choosing the site, as the woodland must have a dense canopy as there was little ground flora. We did find nine species though, the most exciting probably being Wild Angelica (Angelica sylvestris) which was only found twice last year across all of the UK.

Given the poor results, I also carried out a few surveys on my own in my local area. It rained pretty much throughout the first week of January, and I was slightly hampered by a dog that was accompanying me, but I did have some success.

On a countryside walk I found just five species, including holly, ivy, and the bright yellow flowers of gorse.

However, I had most luck just wandering around my suburban housing estate where I found twenty species - many ruderals and 'weeds' growing in the pavement or on grass verges. Perhaps the strangest of these was a dead nettle that had white flowers. However the shape of the leaf looked odd to me -  as it was rounded and scallopped rather than coarse toothed and pointed - so I queried it on iSpot. It was suggested it might be a white form of red dead nettle (Lamium purpureum) but after consulting with vegetative expert John Poland, the BSBI has now confirmed it was just an atypical form of L. album after all. So whilst I didn't find anything terribly exciting, I've learnt a bit more about dead nettles.

Tree Planting at Water Haigh

This weeks task with the Lower Aire Valley volunteers was tree planting in the aptly named Water Haigh reserve. Located on the banks of the River Aire and the Aire & Calder Navigation, the site is subject to flooding, and work is being done to enhance the area as a flood alleviation zone.  As part of this work, several fields are being planted with trees.  Tree planting had previously taken place on the site but unfortunately most of the saplings had failed.  They were not adequately protected and were grazed by both rabbits and deer, so this time care was taken to protect the trees.

A mix of alder, birch, scot's pine and hazel saplings were planted this week by a team of six keen volunteers. Our instructions were to plant the trees 'plantation style' so first we measured out a grid pattern, leaving a gap of 1.5 metres between each tree and loosely tapping in a support stake to mark the position where the tree would go.

The ground was fairly wet and it was easy to dig the small slot into which the sapling was placed. As the saplings were effectively plug plants, the roots were neatly contained and only a few inches long. It was easy to place the young tree in the ground (making sure that the soil level reached the top of the roots), and then firm the soil around it.

The marker stake was then hammered firmly into the ground.  A tree guard was placed around the tree and firmly attached to the stake. Care was taken to push the tree guard into the soil to prevent any small mammals from getting underneath. The tree guards should protect the trees for several years until they have grown more robust, and can then be removed.

Over 300 young trees were planted, but only a third of the field was covered, so there will no doubt be more tasks here in the future ...

Pond Restoration

Following the surveys I did in the Spring, I wrote a report for each site outlining some recommendations on how the ponds could be managed to benefit amphibians. It was great that I could join the reserves manager last week and start to make improvements to one of the ponds.

Pond clearance is best undertaken in the winter months (November to February) when amphibians are less likely to be present in the pond. Nevertheless, as the pond was known to be home to great-crested newts, only a third of the pond was worked on, leaving plenty of areas undisturbed where newts, efts and other amphibians could retreat to.

The pond was very overgrown with rushes and reeds, with hardly any open water (top photo shows the pond before any work was done). Although still a pond rather than a reed bed, without action it would dry up over the coming years. The invasive pond weed Crassula helmsii had also started to take over, forming a mat on one side of the pond and stretching several metres in.

As it's a relatively small pond, we tackled it by hand. Wearing waders, we got stuck in and found the vegetation was fairly easy to pull up from the roots. The water was also deeper than I thought, reaching mid-thigh on my waders. Whilst this bodes well for the future of the pond, it formed the natural limit of our work!  To try and avoid spreading the Crassula further, the whole mat was rolled back and piled on the side of the pond.

This is still somewhat of an experiment, but it is hoped that by covering the vegetation with black membrane it will die and decompose. We are reluctant to use any chemicals as this would harm the wildlife in the pond. It is unlikely that the Crassula will have been totally removed, but it should slow the spread. The silt stirred up during the work will soon settle and provide a nice area of open water for breeding newts to display, whilst leaving areas of vegetation for egg-laying and protection.  If successful, the work will be repeated next year to remove a further third of the vegetation, and the technique will be repeated on other ponds.

Helping to eradicate Japanese Knotweed

Whilst I was a trainee at the Yorkshire Wildlife Trust, I gained qualifications allowing me to use pesticides/herbicides, but never got the chance to use these skills.  The Invasive Non-Native Species (INNS) project is now at the stage where it is carrying out treatments, and I have been along several times over the last month to help out.

Japanese Knotweed was originally brought to the UK as an ornamental plant, as it looks rather like bamboo and has pretty white flowers. It has large, bright green shield shaped leaves that zig-zag up a pink stem. Although it is infertile, it easily spreads from broken plant fragments, particularly the rhizomous roots. It is often dug up and illegally dumped, which actually makes the problem worse as the plant then occurs in two places!  It is easily spread along roads, rivers and railways via broken off fragments.

As with other invasive plants such as Himalayan Balsam and Giant Hogweed, where they occur along rivers this can be problematic. As well as spreading downstream, they grow fiercely and outshade native plants.

When the invasive plants die back over winter, bare soil is left; this is susceptible to erosion and the whole process exacerbates flooding.

Each invasive plant has a different method of treatment. For Japanese Knotweed, the best method is to inject herbicide directly into the stem of the plant. Special industrial size syringes are used, and each individual stem has to be injected with a calibrated measure of the viscous liquid. This ensures that the chemical goes straight down into the root, meaning that the plant is killed in the root ball and not just above the surface. This will stop it from growing back and spreading further. Another benefit is that, unlike spraying, the chemical only goes into the Japanese Knotweed - no other plants should be damaged, meaning regrowth of native plants will be quicker. There is also virtually no risk to passing people and animals, as the chemical is all inside the plant. 

Protective clothing, boots and gloves have to be worn, making the task quite warm and uncomfortable. A lot of time is spent scrabbling about in the undergrowth on your knees, trying to avoid sharp stones, twigs, rubbish and dog poop, often on steep sided river banks so there is the added task of keeping balance and not slipping into the water. It is not the easiest or most glamorous task!

There are large infestations of Japanese Knotweed on the Rivers Colne and Holme in West Yorkshire, which is where some of the recent work has been carried out. Earlier in the week I was on a stretch of the River Colne between Marsden and Slaithwaite, near the Huddersfield Narrow Canal. There was a massive, continous broad swathe of the weed right along the river bank. After a full days work we managed to treat about a third of it, so further visits will be needed.

A few minutes upstream was a patch of river bank that I helped to treat several weeks ago. It was good to go back and have a look at the effect of our work. All of the Japanese Knotweed had died back, leaving just brown twigs. The photos to the right show the before and after pictures.

It is a mammoth project to try and rid Yorkshire of invasive plant species, but I feel I have played a small part in the battle.

To help, you can report any invasive species that you see using the PlantTracker app on smart phone or via the website. This helps get a better understanding of where invasive plants are, and by mapping them and getting an overall view by river catchment, appropriate action can be planned.

Wildflower Meadow Creation

A sad but well documented fact is that 97% of the UK's wildflower meadows have been lost in the last 100 years. Well, today I helped do something about it. Taking part in a practical task day with the Yorkshire Wildlife Trust's Lower Aire Valley volunteers, myself and a small gang of helpers spread wildflower seed over a large field, and in doing so helped to reverse the trend of our disappearing meadows.

In the weeks leading up to the task, seeds were collected from a donor meadow that has a healthy popluation of wildflowers. These were dried for several days under a polytunnel, then stored in a cool dry place. The field (which previously had horses on it) was prepared by the farmer, though it was only ploughed a few inches deep to break the surface of the soil.

Arriving this morning, there were 8 large bags of seed that needed to be wheel-barrowed a short distance from the car park to the site.  On arriving, we placed the seed bags at intervals across the field, and marked the field into plots. This was actually quite hard as the field is on the peak of a hill and so you can't see one side of the field from the other ... as a result, some of our plots were a little crooked, but it didn't really matter.

We then broke each plot down into more manageable sections, and set about spreading the seed. This was all done by hand. After filling up a small bucket with seed from the large bag, we basically walked up and down the field casting the seed onto the soil. The first plot was the hardest and we were unsure how much seed to use, but soon got a feel for how far one bag would go and thus how generously we should spread the seed.

Luckily it was a fairly still day so the seed went pretty much where it was thrown, but occasionally what little wind there was did change direction, resulting in a face-full of seed!

The task took about four hours to complete, and in the end our planning paid off - we had just enough seed to finish the approx. 7 hectare field. As I was pulling out of the car park, the farmer was just pulling in, and will now have finished rolling the field to push the seed slightly into the soil and prevent it from blowing away.

A popular dog walking area, we had lots of positive feedback from members of the public passing through the site, who seemed genuinely interested in what we were doing. Hopefully when we return next Spring/Summer the meadow at Water Haigh will be a beautiful vision of wildflowers including betony, scabious and yellow rattle, and perhaps even some orchids. As well as improving the aesthetic value of the site, this will also have a knock on impact to other species by providing habitat and food sources for pollinators including butterflies, bees and invertebrates.

MSc Residential Weekend

In September I commenced postgraduate studies, on the MSc in Biodiversity and Conservation with the University of Leeds. I am studying part-time over two years, hoping that a slightly more relaxed study pace will help me really embed the learning, whilst allowing me to continue to volunteer and gain practical experience in conservation and ecological surveying.

One of the first events was to join all the other MSc students and meet some of the staff on a residential weekend held at Malham Tarn FSC in the Yorkshire Dales. This differed from other weekends I have spent at FSC centres in two major ways:

• Normally I drive which means I can chuck as much kit in the car as I want and be prepared for any weather/eventuality. This time I went on a coach from the university, meaning I had to be very selective in what I took as I had to (a) fit it in a rucksack and (b) carry said rucksack half way across Leeds before I could get on the coach.
• The pace this weekend was very relaxed with late starts, early finishes, and plenty of time to chill out. This contrasted sharply with residentials for the MMU UCert, which usually start early and finish late, with no free time to yourself and the stress of being tested hanging over us all weekend.
• Oh, and a third point - the weather was awesome all weekend!

As we went a coach, this could not take us all the way to the field centre as the roads are just to narrow. Instead, a van picked up our luggage and we walked the 3+ miles from Malham village up to the FSC at Malham Tarn.  I have done part of the walk before, but never the section in the middle. Leaving the village, we climbed up the side of Malham Cove and had good views from the top before following the path through a narrow valley then walking around the tarn.

On Saturday we had various activites to try out, and split into smaller groups. In the morning, we met some of the National Trust staff that look after the estate. We did a practical conservation task, using hand saws to chop down willow from the fen. This wasn't too bad, but we then had to remove all of the wood from the fen, dragging it for what felt like a long way (probably less than 0.5km) along the boardwalk to the road. It certainly gave us a good work-out, and I think we were all a little pleased when lunchtime arrived and we could swap tasks.

After lunch we had a go at pond dipping. We tried various techniques, using a figure of eight motion to take samples from different depths of the pond and from vegetated vs open water areas. We decanted the aquatic invertebrates that were caught into sample pots, and took them back to the lab to try and identify them. We were a little short of time to do a very thorough job, but my lab partner and I managed to identify 12+ species.

After afternoon tea (and the compulsory cake), we had a bird-ringing demonstration. Nets were erected close to a bird feeding station, and the fine black netting was virtually impossible to see. Birds that were caught were carefully removed and placed in cloth drawstring bags before being brought back to the table to identify.  As well as identifying species and gender, age and moult status were recorded. This seemed quite hard, as it involved looking at the growth of feathers, and comparing different colour patterns and how much they had faded. We were lucky enough to capture a great spotted woodpecker, so got the chance to see this lovely bird up close. We also had the chance to handle and release the birds.

In the evening, dusk occured just after dinner so we went outside and used bat detectors to identify where the bats were emerging from. We used nets on long poles to catch some of the bats as they were emerging from their roost in the roof of the stables. These were taken inside and we had an interesting talk from Professor John Altringham, and also got the chance to look at live specimens up close and personal.

On Sunday morning, I got up before dawn to watch the bats return to their roost.  I sat in the courtyard and observed their swarming activity, so will know what I am looking for on future bat surveys.

Before breakfast, I also helped with some more birding ringing. On a one to one basis, I got another hour's practice in and it was great to handle a variety of small birds. I am not sure this is something I would like to pursue though: the rings themselves are very tiny and the numbers are difficult to read, and it also needs a lot of patience and manual dexterity to get the birds out of the nets.

Overall, a superb weekend where I got to know the other students and staff a little better, and learned some new techniques.