Friends of Adel Woods

A view over Adel Moor – heather to the right and bracken to the left.

Pteridium Aquilinum, or the lowly bracken is one of the most successful plants on Earth and is found on all continents except Antarctica.  This is great if you like bracken but its success means that it out competes other plants which we want to see, reducing the variety of flora and fauna. Conservation groups in the UK devote time and effort in reducing the effect of bracken on the habitats they manage.

Bracken can be found throughout Adel Woods and in general we leave it to thrive.  However, it has colonised a large section of Adel Moor and, left alone, it will eventually completely suppress the heather and the other plants we want to see there.

Therefore, in conjunction with Steve Joul of Leeds CC, Friends of Adel Woods have decided to start a program to reduce the area of Adel Moor populated by bracken.

There are two basic methods of removing bracken: bashing it or poisoning it.  FOAW’s committee decided that in the first instance we would prefer to see what we can achieve by the organic or traditional method of bashing it.  This is going to involve two bashing sessions at least this year and two or three bashing sessions next year.  The aim of bashing the bracken is to weaken the plants until they die.

Today was our first ever bracken bashing session on the moor and we approached it in a spirit of scientific inquiry – to see how much we could achieve in two hours, and to see which form of bashing would be the most effective.

Three happy men and a pallet!

We had three different methods of bashing.  First, there was the traditional method of bashing the bracken with poles.  This was favoured by David H, Rob H and others.  The second method was pulling up the bracken with as much of the root as possible favoured by Judith and Steph.  The third method was to use a machine designed and made by our very own David S to squash the bracken.

Looking towards the East, the bashing area was to the left, the pulling area was to the right, and the area tackled by David, Andrew, James and your very own correspondent was in the middle.

In two hours we bashed, pulled or squashed thousands of bracken plants over a large area. It was a very satisfying task and one which we all enjoyed.

The David’s machine entailed pulling a pallet over the bracken.  It soon became clear that it was simply going to slide over the top of the bracken without harming it.  Accordingly, Andrew, our resident engineer, designed an adaptation involving tying 5 mattock blades on top of the pallet in order to weight it down – an adaptation which worked very well.

One thing that came as a surprise was to discover how much heather was managing to cling on underneath the bracken.  However it was clear that if action was not taken, the surviving heather would have died out and the area of the bracken would have increased.

In summary, a very enjoyable and satisfying morning’s work.

The orchid meadow

There is always something new to discover in Adel Woods, and two years ago our treasurer,  Judith, brought to our attention a secluded meadow with a beautiful display of common spotted orchids.

Common Spotted Orchid

The meadow is a wonderfully tranquil oasis in the woods, under threat of two kinds of change – firstly the normal process of succession, whereby open grassland slowly changes into oak woodland; and secondly the invasion of Himalayan Balsam.

The meadow already has a range of small oak trees growing within its borders, and it is surrounded by thousands of specimens of Himalayan Balsam – many of which are just coming into flower and will send their seeds onto the meadow.

Removing trees

Our task today, under the guidance of Steve Joul, senior ranger with Leeds City Council, was therefore threefold.  Firstly, to find out how many common spotted orchids we have in the meadow.  Secondly, to remove some of the trees.  Thirdly, to remove as much of the Himalayan Balsam as possible from the immediate vicinity of the orchids.

The great thing is that there was an even more splendid display of orchids than the last couple of years.  Steve was keen to count them and came to a figure of 2,690! – a figure far higher than any of us expected.

As Steve counted the orchids, the rest of us cleared oak trees (about 5) and pulled up Himalayan Balsam plants.  Your correspondent estimates that between us we pulled up around 20,000, and we were able to clear the entire southwest boundary of the species.

After working on the orchid meadow, we went to have a look at Adel Bog, another beautiful secluded spot in the woods.  Here we were treated to a wonderful display of heath spotted orchids, bog asphodel, tormentil and other plants.

Heath Spotted Orchid with yellow flowers of the Bog Asphodel in background

Heath spotted orchids (dactylorhiza maculata) are very similar to common spotted orchids (dactylorhiza fuchsia).  Steve can tell you the difference!

Another wonderful morning in Adel Woods.

Inspecting the flora on Adel Bog

Thank you to Alan and Diane Yarker who welcomed Friends of Adel Woods to their smallholding today – to mark National Meadows Day.

Alan gave us an interesting talk about aspects of running a smallholding, and management of a meadow in the traditional way to encourage bio-diversity. In the course of his talk, Alan told us about a very interesting website “Tracks in Time” at http://tithemaps.leeds.gov.uk/TwinMaps.aspx?township=WYL333_334 which enables us to compare historic maps with modern day maps – it is very interesting to see how Alwoodley and Adel have changed over the years.

Unlike last year, when the temperature was very cold, and rain almost horizontal, the heavens confounded the gloomy weather forecast with a beautiful afternoon.

After the talk we were free to wonder around the smallholding and Steve and Alan took us on a tour of the meadow to have a first look at the wildflowers. What appeared from a distance to be a field of grass contained a treasure trove of wildflowers. Your correspondent is no expert, but can confidently tell you that among other plants in this picture you can see white clover, red clover, cats-ear, birdsfoot trefoil, mouse-ear, common sorrell, yorkshire fog and crested dogstail. There may well be some smooth hawksbeard and plantain too.

One of the “stars” of the meadow is the population of common spotted orchids which have been increasing in recent years.

After a cup of tea and biscuits provided by Steve Joul, Steve led a group of us in an initial survey of the meadow. The first step is to choose an area of the meadow at random and stake out a quadrat – an area two metres by two metres. The next step is to note the range of flora we can see within the quadrat, and finally to estimate what percentage of the quadrat is taken up by each species of plant.

Ideally we would have surveyed ten quadrats, but we had time for only two. However, each of our quadrats contained about twenty species of plant.

Having completed our survey of the quadrats, we quickly counted the common spotted orchids and were able to delight Alan with the news that there were at least 123!

Common Spotted Orchid

Birdsfoot Trefoil

Cats Ear

Adel Bog – looking to the East

Adel Bog is a wonderful haven of tranquillity in the middle of Adel Woods.

Working with a smile!

Over the last six years Friends of Adel Woods and other groups have done a lot of work to prevent it disappearing through the process of succession – the gradual change from bog to oak woodland – because the bog is a special habitat in the context of Adel Woods, home to a number of plants like the heath spotted orchid, bog asphodel, tormentil.

Clearing brambles

Today, an enthusiastic group of volunteers, under the guidance of Steve Joul, senior ranger with Leeds City Council, spent a happy couple of  hours removing tree seedlings and bramble from the bog.

Have a look at our blog entry for 16 July for some pictures of the flowers in the woods.

Adel Bog – looking to the West

The weather forecast was dire – heavy rain all morning.  But it was dry at 10 am and six of us met with Steve Joul at the Slabbering Baby entrance to the woods to work on Adel Moor.

Adel Moor: 21 May 2016

In fact it turned out to be a perfect morning for working on the moor – warm, with a pleasant breeze, and a lightly overcast sky with sunny intervals. In addition to the bird song, we heard cattle lowing from the direction of Adel, confirming the impression that we were in the middle of the countryside.

A successful tussle with a tree root!

Adel Moor was looking fantastic this morning, with abundant heather and bilberry plants, and two clumps of gorse in full flower.

Our task this morning was to remove saplings and brambles from the moor and between us we removed several hundred seedlings and saplings and one mature tree.

We planned to do some bracken bashing today because bracken has taken over several hundred square yards of the moor, suppressing all other plant life, but it had only just started to appear.  So we will have to bash the bracken (the traditional way of controlling bracken is to bash it)  later in the season.

Thanks to Steve and everyone who came for a very enjoyable morning’s work.

We held our AGM this evening in the bar of Old Leo’s Rugby Club.

The minutes of the 2015 AGM were approved, and the Chair and Treasurer gave their reports. The Chair’s report is set out below.

Nominations for officers and committee took place, the following being the result:

Chair: Roger Gilbert; Treasurer: Judith White

Secretary: Stephanie Clarke; Auditor: David Hall

Committee (in addition to the above, and in no particular order):

Rob Hall; David Smith; David Hampshire; Brian Joyce

We have ten places on the committee, but only eight members at the moment.  If you are interested in joining us, please let the Chair know.

Thank you to everyone who attended. Thank you to all the officers and committee members who have served last year and volunteered to serve this coming year. Tom Swire stood down from the committee and we are grateful for his work and support over the years.  Hopefully, we shall still see him at our monthly events.

Thank you finally to Old Leo’s Rugby Club for letting us use their bar for the AGM.

The Chair’s report

To prepare this review, I had a look at our blog and we have had about 20 events since our last AGM – which is two more than in the year prior to our  AGM in May 2015. It has been another varied, interesting and enjoyable year.

If you have not had a look at the blog, I think that it is well worth doing so. I find it amazing how much we have done together, and I get very happy feelings looking at the pictures and reading the reports of our achievements.

Events

We have two kinds of events: the tasks (the playing out in the woods events) and the educational events (the playing out in the woods events!). In both, we are incredibly lucky to be supported in what we do by Steve Joul, senior ranger with Leeds CC.

Educational/social events

There have been four of these in the last year:

A visit to Alan Yarker’s small holding and survey of meadow plants on 14 June

I missed this as I was on holiday, but it was a great success – apart from the weather. We are very grateful to Alan who is opening his small holding to FOAW again this year. Steve Joul made a survey of meadow plants

Bat walk on 4 September

Bat spotting!

This was a tremendous success. Our treasurer rang me about 40 minutes before we met and said she was bringing her grandchildren, so there would be about five of us. In fact, people kept arriving and in the end there were between 75 and 80 people. Unfortunately, there were very few bats – though this did not seem to affect the excitement and enthusiasm of participants as we walked round the woods. In fact, each time a bat registered on the 9 or so bat detectors it seemed even more exciting.

Two members of the FOAW tree huggers section

Tree walk on 18 October

This was an afternoon walk with Steve Joul. We had an excellent turn out of about 35 including many children. It was a lovely walk.

Birdsong walk

Fifteen of us joined Steve Joul for a birdsong walk last Saturday. It was a beautiful morning and we and heard many birds. Perhaps the highlight for me was to see a mistle thrush collecting mud and flying up to a fork in a tree to build her nest.

Tasks

We have had our usual varied range of “tasks”.

Firstly, there has been our regular litterpicking whose importance cannot be overstated. Litterpicking makes a huge difference to the woods. I haven’t kept a tally but we must have picked up well over 60 bags of litter over the year.

Adel Moor

Over the last year we have had two mornings working on Adel Moor (May and July) and – in conjunction with the other groups who work on the moor – we are now seeing a huge improvement – a lot of the young saplings have gone and there is lots of new heather coming up. I know that Steve Joul is very pleased indeed with the progress that is being made.

Path improvements

Path clearance has been another regular task. Over the last year Friends have worked on improving paths – clearing mud, cutting back branches and removing fallen trees – on two occasions.

Adel Bog

Adel Bog: June 2015

In 2011 BTCV cleared a lot of purple moor grass from Adel Bog, paid for in part by Leeds CC and the Parish Council. We have continued that work clearing a lot of encroaching vegetation such as brambles which were slowly turning the bog into dry land. Bog plants are returning.

Nest boxes

We had two days out in January surveying the nest boxes and the good news is that they were almost all used. You can feel pleased that there is a good chance that the great tits and blue tits in the woods were reared in a FOAW nestbox!

The Buck Stone

Three years ago we did two days work on the Buck Stone and made it accessible to the public again. On 24 April this year we spent a morning tidying it up and we removed a large amount of brambles.

The hospice woodland

We had two sessions working on the Hospice Woodland one with with Steve Joul – thinning out the trees as they have been planted too close together – and the other picking up litter, clearing encroaching brambles and clearing paths. A very enjoyable and productive morning

Adel Pond

Adel Pond is one of our regular jobs now. In October we got down and dirty clearing silt out of the pond – using our new pond gloves – and we made a big difference. It is looking great at the moment.

The orchid meadow

Last year we had a tremendous display of common spotted orchids in a field near the cricket pitch. We are going to do some work this year to protect them from encroaching trees and himalayan balsam.

Himalayan Balsam

Speaking of Himalayan Balsam we had an event at short notice clearing it from the end of Crag Lane. What became clear is that it is a task which needs to be carefully targeted because it really is a hopeless task to eradicate the plant.

The Christmas Garlands:

We had another session making Christmas garlands for sale to raise funds and we raised about £100.

Fundraising

Currently, we have sufficient funds to meet our expenses.

The future

We will be publishing our program for the next year shortly. We will be having the usual variety of tasks. Our next event is Saturday the 21 May when we will be litterpicking and working on Adel Moor!

At the beginning of July, Alan Yarker, who is a local small holder will give a talk to Friends, and following that Steve will lead volunteers in surveying a meadow on Alan’s smallholding.

We are hoping to get the local scouts and guides involved – possibly bracken bashing this Summer

Thanks

So in summary, I would just like to end by thanking all the people we need to thank for supporting us over the last year.

First of all, I would like to thank Steve Joul for all the support – and tuition – he has given us over the year.

I would like to thank Alwoodley Parish Council and our local city councillors for their financial support and encouragement.

I really must thank Tony and Old Leo’s for letting us use their facilities for making the Christmas garlands and have our AGM here. Please after the meeting, can you please drink as much as you can so that they’ll have us again!

I would like to thank our committee and officers for all their support and hard work over the year.

And finally, I would like to thank all our wonderful Friends – whether here or absent – for the hard work you have all put in over the year. I hope that tonight’s summary has reminded you of some happy mornings or evenings and shown you that you have all made a fantastic improvement to the state of Adel Woods and to our local community.

Thank you!

Steve Joul led a group of enthusiastic birdwatchers this morning.  Here is a report, written by the man himself – plus at the end a few additional miscellaneous sightings.  In all we spotted 27 species of bird – not bad for a morning’s birdwatching in a woodland on the edge of the city.

Adel Wood – Birdsong Walk 07.05.16

This Friends of Adel Woods walk was led by myself, Steve Joul, Leeds City Council Countryside Ranger. 15 people met in the car park at 7am when much of the talk from regulars was of how much better the weather was today compared to 12 months ago when we undertook our walk during heavy rain!

Although it was cool at first the sun gradually forced its way through the haze as a hot and sunny day developed.

After introductions, we watched a Great Spotted Woodpecker and listed to Chiffchaff before walking down the track towards the Cricket Club. Along the way were Wren, Robin, Song Thrush and Blackcap.

At the cricket ground a male Mistle Thrush fed on the pitch before flying up and singing from a Poplar tree, freshly clothed in shiny green leaves.

We then crossed Adel Moor where a Willow Warbler was singing and made our way to the Buckstone a sandstone feature that gives its name to the nearby housing estate. This had been recently tidied by the Friends of Adel Woods.

Next, we made our way to the Seven Arches Aqueduct which brought from Eccup Reservoir Leeds’ first alternative water supply to the River Aire. Here, we spotted a Nuthatch calling and searching upside down on a branch for food.

Further along the Meanwood Valley Trail we watched another Mistle Thrush carrying a large quantity of mud in her beak. She returned several times to build her nest in the fork of a Birch tree.

Arriving at the Slabbering Baby Spring, which marks the former location of Verity’s Tea Rooms, those who had important business to attend to returned to the car park. However, it was developing into such a lovely morning tht the remainder of the group decided to continue past Mill Fall Pond (the newt pond) and along Adel Beck to the Stairfoot Steps.

Along the way we enjoyed the colourful streamside flora which included Golden Saxifrage, Hard Fern and a superb bank of Marsh Marigold. Those at the front of the party also saw a Red Fox.

Up the steps we climbed, then past Adel Crag to the Hospice Wood where we were delighted by a trio of neat and colourful Bullfinches.

27 Bird species seen or heard

Blackbird: too many to count

Blackcap: 4 males singing: good views of 1 perched.  2 males chasing 1 female close by.

Blue tit:  too many to count

Bullfinch:  2 males chasing with female close by

Carrion crow: 2 including 1 mobbing a red kite

Chiff Chaff:  6 calling males including 1 bathing in a puddle

Dunnock: 1 pair seen, not calling

Goldfinch [noted by Sylvia]

Great spotted woodpecker: 1 female called observed in a tall tree

Great tit: 7 males singing

Grey heron: 1 flew over

Jay [noted by Roger]

Jackdaw:  1 flew over

Long tailed tit: 3 pairs seen foraging; 1 pair flew to nest

Magpie [noted by Roger]

Mallard:  3 flew over

Mistle thrush: 1 male singing in tree; 1 female carrying mud to nest

Nuthatch:  3 calling

Red kite:  1 pair, mobbed by carrion crow

Robin: too many to count

Skylark:  1 flying over neighbouring farmland

Song thrush:

Starling:

Stock dove: 1 pair occupying owl box

Swallow:  1 male singing on the wing

Wood pigeon: too many to count

Wren: too many to count.

Miscellaneous Sightings

In addition to the above, the group also saw:  3 blackbird eggs (hatched or destroyed by a predator); 8 campers and a tent; speckled wood butterfly; dog violet; ivy leaved speedwell; greater stitchwort; seven spotted ladybird; peacock butterfly; small tortoiseshell butterfly; orange tip butterfly (thanks for Sylvia for this information).

Lesser Celandine: Adel Woods, May 2010

The Buck Stone is a large outcrop of rock in the woods behind Buckstone Avenue.  It has been shown on maps for at least 200 years and the Buckstone estate is named after it!

The Friends of Adel Woods have worked on the area around the Buck Stone in recent years to ensure that it is remains an impressive feature of the woods and is not overgrown by trees, bracken and brambles.

When we first worked on the Buck Stone, we created a woodpile with the tree branches which we had cut – not only does it look neat, but it also creates a habitat for beetles, other insects and small animals.  When we arrived today, your correspondent was dismayed to see that all that was left of our log pile were a few charred logs.  It seems that last week someone set fire to it and the fire brigade had to be called.

Today we had a large group of Friends – including some enthusiastic young people – which was great.

The bracken had not yet broken through the surface of the ground and the main work was pulling up brambles – which we left on our log pile!

Again, we were blessed with good weather, and a good time was had by all.

An overcast but mild morning.  Only two days to the first day of Spring, and there was plenty of bird song to be heard.  There was also plenty of frog spawn in Adel Pond.

A good day for our Big Spring Clean.  Eleven of us met up to pick up litter.  There would doubtless have been more of us, but there was an unfortunate clash with a walk with Alwoodley Walkabout.

The woods actually looked reasonably tidy before we started:  last year’s undergrowth has all died back and this year’s growth has yet to begin.  The fact that we have picked up probably about five hundred bags of rubbish over the last six years – and removed lots of flytipped articles such as tyres, beer barrels, TVs and chemical drums – has clearly had a positive impact on the appearance of the woods.

Today we started in Old Leo’s, and then we worked our way along Crag Lane (in both directions),  and picked up litter from the fields, from the hospice woodland, around the Crag, and along the stream.  We probably picked up an average of two bags each – so twenty two bags in all.  In addition, Stephanie found a television and the remains of a fridge.  Tom found the remains of a duvet and your chairman found the remains of what appeared to be an iron bedstead in the stream.  However, the rubbish consists mainly of bottles, cans, crisp packets,sweet wrappers and bags of doggies’ do do.

With regard to the last mentioned, I know that the members of FOAW would like me to extend a big thank you to the dog owners who wrap their pooch’s excrement in black plastic bags and then throw the bags into the woods – or even hang them on trees.  We really enjoy the feeling of nausea as we pick these up and put them into our sacks of rubbish.

That aside, we all really enjoy our time in the woods, and the time we spend together, doing our best to make the woods as pleasant as possible for everyone to enjoy.

Thank you to everyone who turned out today.

.

Another great turn out of about 11.  We carried out three different tasks.

Fresh from building a railway!

Some of us went off an litter picked.

Some of us went and cleared mud, stones and leaf litter of the steps down from the Stairfoot Lane carpark.

Some, led by Steph, went up to the Hospice Woodland to clear away some of the brambles from the trees.  They were later joined by the step clearers.

Clearing brambles from the daffodils in the Hospice Woodland

A very satisfying morning.