A beautiful morning, but – By Gum – it was cold first thing! It took your correspondent 20 minutes to scrape the ice off the car windows – including inside! Nevertheless, eleven Friends turned out for this morning’s work party. Five of us litterpicking. and the rest of us path clearing. And it was a lovely day for working in the woods.
The litter pickers picked up about six bags of rubbish on Buckstone Road, the Village Green, Crag Lane, the Hospice Woodland and on the track down to the cricket pavilion.
For the path clearers the objective this morning was to improve the path running alongside Adel Beck. Historically, there has been a path by the beck on the Alwoodley side all the way from Stairfoot Lane bridge down to the Spring Hill bridge, just downhill from the Slabbering Baby. However, in recent years the path has become overgrown and muddy and its route unclear at the halfway point, in the region of Adel Bog. Our focus today was to work on the path from Spring Hill bridge up to the midway point.
Getting under way: the path by Adel Beck – Spring Hill bridge can just be seen to the right
Near Spring Hill bridge, the path had been eroded away by the beck, making it a bit hazardous, as can be seen in the photograph above. One of our first jobs was therefore to move the route of the path further away from the stream and remove brambles and a large sapling which was growing across the path.
Looking towards Spring Hill Bridge
The main things to tackle today were brambles and holly which were making the path very narrow – even before the growing season starts again.
Making our way home
In the space of two hours we were able to accomplish our aims, though there is still a lot to do – principally to improve the muddy sections of the path and to improve way marking.
BeforeAfterViews of Spring Hill Bridge before and after clearing brambles and saplings
The two photographs show the difference made in the vicinity of Spring Hill bridge. The tree on the left can just be seen in the “before” photograph though it is obscured by the brambles which we removed. You can also see to the right of the tree the stump of the large sapling which we removed because it was growing across the path.
Adel Beck path looking upstream from the vicinity of Spring Hill bridge – after clearing and widening the path
Another satisfying and successful morning for the Friends of Adel Woods!
Today was the second (and concluding) part of the Friends of Adel Woods annual nest box survey and Spring clean. Yesterday (in part 1) we started by surveying the nest boxes to the north of Crag Lane and spent the afternoon surveying the nest boxes on the Meanwood Valley Trail from the picnic area down to just short of Adel Pond.
This was another day which defied the weather forecast and turned out to be a lovely harbinger of the nesting season.
We met at 10 am in Old Leo’s car park. Five Friends turned out, including two who were taking part in the nest box survey and Spring clean for the first time!
Today, our first task was to put up “Tina’s nest box”, so named because Tina gave it to us! Situated on Crag Lane, near Old Leo’s car park, it is without doubt our best nest box, being made of woodcrete, a mixture of concrete and straw. It is spacious, dry, and designed to let the inhabitants nest well back from the entrance hole, away from the reach of predators. We cleaned it out yesterday, but found it too heavy to put back. Today with the use of a “stand off” to the ladder, we were able to put it back up.
From the car park, we made our way down to the pond with our wheelbarrow, ladders and equipment and started with box 42, just to the north of the pond. This contained a blue tit nest (we know because the entrance hole is 25 mm, so too small for birds like great tits) and the presence of droppings indicated that it had been used for roosting.
Cleaning out nest box 42
Incidentally, the reason we clean out the nest boxes each year, is that the species which use our nest boxes – like blue tit, great tit, sparrow and nuthatch – do not re-use nests from previous years. This was made clear by the lockdown in January 2021 which prevented us from cleaning our nest boxes that year. When we surveyed the boxes in January 2022, most nest boxes contained two nests, one on top of the other. It is also clear why the birds evolved to make new nests each year: when we clean out the boxes, the old nests are often full of lice and mites, droppings from roosting birds, and damp, rotted moss – not a great environment for young birds.
Nest box 38 – a sparrow nest?
Our next nest box was number 38, just by the bridge below the pond. This was unusual in that it seemed to contain a sparrow nest – which is made of straw – rather than a tit nest which is made of moss and fine grass. On several occasions, nuthatches have nested in this location, but not this year.
We then surveyed and cleaned out the nest boxes on the Meanwood Valley Trail from the Slabbering Baby down to Seven Arches, finishing at about 1.45 pm.
In all, we cleaned and surveyed seventeen nest boxes today. This is the overall summary:
twelve boxes contained tit nests;
one box contained an incomplete tit nest;
one appeared to contain a sparrow nest, but strangely it had a small amount of moss (which is typical of a tit nest) on the top;
two small nest boxes which we put up last year were not used, but one contained a small amount of moss;
one of the boxes containing a tit nest had clearly been used initially by nuthatches, but it looks as though they were driven out;
another box showed extensive work by nuthatches, but there was no nest.
I mentioned above that there was some evidence of nuthatches in the nest boxes but no nuthatch nests. In some years we have found one or two nuthatch nests. They are very distinctive for two reasons. Firstly, nuthatches seal all possible gaps in the nest box with copious amounts of mud, both on the inside and outside – and sometimes make the entrance hole smaller. Secondly, the nest is not made with moss and grass but with bark chips, so the nest box looks rather as if someone has tipped some bran flakes into it.
Courtesy of RSPB websiteA nuthatch and a nuthatch nest: note the mud around the top of the box
Nuthatches are very sleek looking birds which are the only UK bird that can climb headfirst down a tree trunk!
A view of Meanwood Beck through the trees in Adel Woods: 15th January 2023
Time again to get the ladders out, get out in the woods, and clean and survey the Friends of Adel Woods nest boxes! We have put up forty three since 2010 and surveying them is always an interesting and sociable activity.
Despite a dire weather forecast for today, the weather started off quite reasonably and got better and sunnier throughout the morning. Eight of us turned out for this morning’s start on the job, and five of us returned for the afternoon shift.
Meeting in Old Leo’s car park
We met in Old Leo’s car park at 10 am and, led by Steve Joul our wildlife adviser, we set off into Alwoodley plantation.
Our first job was to put up a new bat box which we had been given by two of our Friends.
We put up seven bat boxes in 2010 to provide shelter for bats to roost in over the Summer months, and hopefully hibernate in over the Winter.
We are not allowed to have a look inside the bat boxes, but one fell off the tree a couple of years ago and this was a good opportunity to replace it.
If you look at the photo, you will see that bat boxes are very different from tit boxes: there is no entrance hole on the front! Bats enter the box by landing on the wood protruding downwards beneath the box and then crawling up into the box through a slit in the bottom. So you can see that bats powers to negotiate the environment by echo-location are truly astonishing.
You can also see that there are bat boxes on the left and right hand side of the tree. This is because bats are sensitive to temperature, and we put the boxes on different sides of the tree so that they can choose the one that suits them best.
Ten unhatched eggs from nest box 5
Having put up the bat box we headed further into Alwoodley Plantation, our first stop being nest box 5 on a Scots pine near the Devil’s Rock. This contained a nest but there were ten unhatched eggs of various sizes. We measured them and came to the conclusion that they were probably great tit eggs. We’ll never know what happened, but presumably the parents were taken by predators. As you can see the eggs are very small, and it is a source of wonder that in a matter of weeks great tits (or blue tits) can develop into fully adult birds from such small beginnings.
Cleaning nest box 5The new bat boxTaking down “Tina’s” nest box near Old Leo’s
There is always plenty to do on the nest box surveys: Steve carries the ladder; one of us pushes the wheelbarrow loaded with all the tools which are needed to clean and, if necessary repair, the boxes; one of us (usually Steve or yours truly) climbs the ladder to bring the nest boxes down to the ground. We then take it in turns to open the box, and clean it before returning it to the tree. One of us makes a note of what we find, and one of us scouts around to find the next nest box: sometimes it can be very hard to find them and occasionally we don’t!
At about 12.50, having surveyed sixteen nest boxes, we decided it was time for a lunch break and we headed back to yours truly’s home to eat our sandwiches, and have a cup of tea and a piece of cake.
Duly replenished, we were back in the woods by 2.30, when we surveyed two nest boxes on Crag Lane, and then made our way down the Meanwood Valley trail from the picnic area down to Adel Pond – surveying another seven nest boxes until dusk arrived and it started to rain and hail!
In summary, today we surveyed twenty five nest boxes. Twenty one of these were tit boxes and four were robin boxes.
Of the twenty one tit boxes, all had been used for nesting except for one which had fallen off the tree. We cannot say that all of the nests were successful. Some clearly were as the nest looked used and was empty. Some had one or two eggs left in the nest and the assumption is that the other ten or so eggs hatched and the youngsters fledged. As reported above, the first nest box we surveyed contained ten unhatched eggs. Another nest box contained the macabre remains of eleven chicks. Presumably their parents were predated.
Turning to the robin boxes, the RSPB website says this about robin nesting habits:
“Most nests are located on or near the ground in hollows, nooks and crannies, climbing plants, hedgebanks, tree roots, piles of logs and any other situations which provide a fully concealed cavity.
“If a nestbox is provided to attract robins, it needs to be open-fronted, and placed in a hidden location in a climber or other such vegetation. Robins are famous for nesting in all kinds of unlikely locations, including sheds, kettles, boots, hanging baskets, coat pockets, under car bonnets, in farm machinery, even on boats in daily use.“
Robin nest boxes differ from tit boxes in that they have a large entrance – as shown in this photo taken when nest box 15 was made.
Clearly a nest box like this is very easy for a predator, such as a squirrel, to enter, so when we put them up in January 2010 we placed them on tree trunks a couple of feet off the ground in the middle of holly bushes. Two unintended consequences of this are (a) that they are very painful to reach to survey and (b) we have never been able to find one of the robin boxes which we put up!
None of the robin boxes have been used by robins for nesting. Occasionally, over the years they have been used by tits for nesting.
This year, two of the robin boxes contained a mass of oak leaves showing that they had been used by squirrels for roosting.
It was a very satisfying and enjoyable day, but yours truly was glad to get home and have a hot bath!
Views of Adel Woods on Saturday the 14th January 2023
Today the plan was to help David Preston to carry out further work on Adel Bog. Unfortunately, due to a puncture to his van tyre, he was unable to join us, and so, while two of us did some litterpicking, six of us did some path clearing.
The path we chose was the raised path which runs from Adel Pond, along the north side of Adel Bog, towards Stairfoot Lane.
The trees on each side of this path are mainly holly which were creating a dark canopy over the path. We removed a great deal of holly from above the path.
We used the offcuts to create some dead-hedging between the path and Adel Bog.
Looking along the path in the direction of Stairfoot Lane: dead hedging on the left of the pathLooking back towards Adel Pond
Another successful and enjoyable morning in the woods.
We never know how many people will turn up to a Friends of Adel Woods event, but today wonderful weather, and the chance to learn about fungi from the amazing Steve Joul brought out approximately forty five people including number of enthusiastic youngsters!
We met up in Alwoodley Village Green car park at 2.30 pm, and, after a short introduction, Steve led us into Adel Woods. Our first stop was a few yards along Crag Lane to inspect the remaining trunk of a mighty tree which fell about ten years ago, demolishing part of the garage next to it. This tree trunk always gives a display of numerous species of fungi, and today was no exception.
We then moved on to Alwoodley Plantation to the north of Crag Lane. Here many sharp-eyed fungi hunters brought Steve numerous specimens to identify. Steve astounded us all by his knowledge not only of their common names, but his amazing knowledge of their formal latin names.
Steve collected the specimens in a wicker basket (an essential tool of the fungi enthusiast) and at the end of the walk paused to do a recap of what we had seen and found. In all we found about twenty five species of fungi and a complete list appears at the end of this report.
Candlesnuff Fungus
The event finished at about 4.30. It was a fabulous afternoon, and the trees looked beautiful in the evening sun. An added and unexpected bonus was the appearance of a handful of bats hunting for insects in the tree canopy (not visible in the photographs).
Alwoodley Plantation: Saturday, 12th November 2022
Here is a list of the species of fungi which we found this afternoon:
We woke this morning to a clear blue sky and a beautiful day. What better way to spend the morning than in Adel Woods?
We had two activities planned for this morning – to work on Adel Pond and to litterpick. Our treasurer, Judith, added a third, namely to go and clear away grass and other vegetation growing around the stone monument marking the Hospice Woodland. And a great job she made of it, as shown by the photograph below. Unfortunately, she was unable to take a photograph showing its state before she began due to the angle of the sun.
The entrance to the Hospice Woodland, Stairfoot Lane, Adel Woods, Leeds.
Only one Friend, Sue, chose to litterpick today, and she picked up two bags of rubbish, mainly around the rugby club and Stairfoot Lane car parks. Thank you Sue!
While Judith and Sue set off on their respective missions, the remaining nine of us made our way with David Preston, our local Parks and Countryside Ranger, to work on Adel Pond.
There were three aspects to our work on the pond. Firstly, to remove small trees and overhanging branches from around the edge of the pond, in order to let more light in and to reduce the number of leaves falling into the pond.
Sizing up small trees and overhanging branches for removal
Secondly, to remove silt from the pond. Thirdly, to clear mud and leaves from the ditches leading into the pond. This involved a lot of digging of mud from the pond and ditches, and removing it to somewhere it will not wash back into the pond.
Clearing silt from Adel Pond
It was hard work, but of course there was time for a bit of nature watching!
Today was our third and final bracken pulling morning on Adel Moor.
Despite rain as we got up – and an unpromising weather forecast – it turned out yet again to be a lovely morning. Again we had a lovely group of seven enthusiastic and hardworking Friends.
We set ourselves the target of clearing a triangular area of bracken adjacent to the area we cleared last Wednesday. And we more or less achieved our aim! The first photograph below shows the area at 10.11 am, and the second photograph shows the same area two hours later at 12.15 pm, after we had finished carrying all the pulled bracken to a compost heap in the woods.
Before pulling bracken……and after.
If you think that bracken looks good and are wondering why we pull it up , the brown patches in the photo above give an indication: where bracken has been established for a while, all other plants die off and we are left with a monoculture of bracken. Fortunately, quite a lot of heather and bilberries were hanging on under the bracken we pulled up. Bilberries and heather are both typical and desirable moorland plants. In the photo above, the bilberries are the green plants in the middle right.
At this time of year the moor looks fantastic – as you can see from the next two photographs.
Heather on Adel Moor, 24th August 2022
The post and brown tube you can see in the foreground of the photograph above is used by mason bees and leaf cutter bees and is part of a study by Leeds University to understand more about bee biodiversity in urban areas.
Heather on Adel MoorThree tired but happy Friends of Adel Woods
For more information about bracken pulling on Adel Moor, see our blog posts for the 10th August and 17th August.
This was our second Wednesday “work party” during August in which we focused on pulling bracken on Adel Moor. Again we had a very good turn out of nine “Friends” and it was another lovely morning. We have one more bracken pulling session this year – next Wednesday, the 24th.
If you are wondering why we pull up bracken, it is because it eventually smothers all other plants and diminishes bio-diversity. This was very evident in some parts of the area we worked on today where there no other plants living under the bracken. However, in other parts, we found lots of heather and bilberries still managing to carry on – as can be seen in the “before and after” photographs below.
Before……and after!
Today we focused on a triangular area to the east of the main path crossing the moor from North to South. Again you can see from the photographs below that there was still a lot of heather growing under the bracken and it was very satisfying to bring it to light. In the area beyond and to the left of the area shown in the photographs, there was little growing as can be seen in the last photograph in this post.
Before...After
As we pulled the bracken, we had a lovely surprise when one of our party found a bird’s nest suspended in the top of some bracken fronds. There were empty egg shells in the nest which we identified as a robin’s nest. The fact that the egg shells were still in the nest is probably not a good sign as birds usually remove shells from the nest once the chicks have hatched.
A bird’s nest found in the bracken fronds on Adel MoorThreeFriends of Adel Woods on Adel Moor: 17th August 2022
Another lovely morning. In the foreground, you can see how bare the ground can be once the bracken has been removed. Hopefully, other plants will now have a chance to repopulate the moor.
Fortunately, you can also see lots of heather and gorse in the background.
Our agenda today was litterpicking through the woods, and removing bracken, brambles and saplings from Adel Moor. As can be seen from the photos we were blessed with lovely weather.
Two of us chose to litterpick and gathered about three bags of rubbish during the morning.
Our intrepid litterpickers!
The rest of us, eight in all, spent a warm morning working on the moor, focusing mainly on pulling up bracken. If you are wondering why we do this, it is because bracken is extremely prolific and eventually smothers and kills off all other plants. In the photo below, you can clearly see, just beyond our Friends, the dividing line between the heather (which we are trying to encourage) and the lighter green bracken.
Adel Moor is special as the last remaining piece of heathland in Leeds and it is also host to a population of common lizards, though we didn’t see any today.
In the last three Springs, green hairstreak butterflies have been found on the moor. They are not a rare species nationally but until 2020 they were only found in the Leeds area on Otley Chevin.
Fortunately, bracken is usually pretty easy to pull up, though the main part of the root is left in the ground and it takes several years of “bracken bashing” to kill bracken off.
It was heartening to find plenty of heather still hanging on beneath the fronds of bracken.
Two piles of bracken and four of our bracken bashers.
At the end of the morning’s work, the bracken is carried into the surrounding woodland for composting
At the end of the morning’s work, the bracken is carried into the surrounding woodland for composting.Time for lunch!
It has been a beautiful week weatherwise, with soaring temperatures yesterday. Still a nice day today, but fortunately a lot cooler at 10 am this morning.
Twelve Friends today: four of us to pick up litter and eight of us clearing paths.
Having furnished the litter pickers with equipment and bags, the path clearers set off with the ultimate aim of widening the path that runs South across the meadow between the picnic area and the Meanwood Valley Trail.
First, though, we made our way to the path heading north off Crag Lane from the back of Old Leo’s clubhouse. The entrance to this path had become much narrower due to encroaching grass, nettles, brambles and other plants, and so we widened the entrance and trimmed back the more prominent holly further up the path. We also removed a large fallen branch from the path.
From there we made our way back to Crag Lane, heading in the direction of the picnic area. However, we had only gone a few yards when one of our Friends made the amazing discovery of a mole snuffling around in the foliage at the edge of the path.
A mole wandering about on Crag Lane
We all stopped work to have a look at him or her. It was the first time your correspondent had ever seen a mole – and probably the first time any of us had! We didn’t touch the mole but watched it wander around. It seemed completely unaware of our presence, but also seemed not to know where it was going. We speculated that it had lost its way and could not make its way back underground because the ground was so hard. One of us poured out some water for it and it immediately lapped it up. We were worried for its safety as we could hear dogs nearby, but fortunately it made its way into the undergrowth and we left it to its own devices. What an exciting start to the day!
As we made our way along Crag Lane, we cut back foliage which was encroaching most onto the path.
Once we reached the picnic area, we took the path down to the Meanwood Valley Trail which had become very narrow. But first, two of us made a detour to ensure that the drainage pipe under the path just beyond the picnic area was clear. We dug out the mud from the entrance and exit ditches, and cleared the mud from the pipe.
Clearing the drainage pipe near the picnic area
By now, the sun was out and it was hot work clearing the path. One or two of our Friends were extremely pink in the face! However, we made good progress before finishing at 12 noon.
Widening the path from the picnic area down to the Meanwood Valley Trail
Having finished work, some of us went to have a look at the orchids in the orchid meadow (otherwise known as the cricket meadow).
Friends of Adel Woods in full colour after a very enjoyable morning
The meadow was an absolute picture, full of buttercups and orchids, clover and all sorts of grasses and other wild plants.
Common spotted orchids, buttercups and clover in the orchid meadow, Adel Woods
We first discovered this meadow in 2014. At that time it contained a large number of common spotted orchids but it was in a poor state: trees and Himalayan Balsam were beginning to take over. We began work on the meadow under the supervision of Steve Joul in 2016 and it has been transformed into a wonderful haven for wild flowers and insects. We have removed the trees and most of the Himalayan Balsam, and Steve has mown the meadow each Autumn for the last three years. Our new ranger, David Preston, is planning to mow the meadow again this Autumn.
You can see what the meadow looked like in 2016 here.
Thank you to all the Friends who joined us today. The litter pickers picked up about three bags of litter.
The orchid meadow, 18 June 2022. There are a lot more orchids than you might think!
Friends of Adel Woods 