If you would like to volunteer for next years butterfly survey, please contact us using the contact form on this website.
‘A Picture is worth a thousand words’ so says the well know English idiom. And this was amply illustrated by Dr Tim Birch, a Director and Head of Living Landscapes at Derbyshire Wildlife Trust, at his recent talk titled ‘A Vision for the Uplands’ where he spoke to 60 members of Buxton Civic Association at their September Members meeting.
Tim put a picture on the screen of a chunk of Welsh hillside. The hillside was divided by a fence that ran from the road up to the rocky cliff top. To the left was the usual sheep grazed scene, shorn of all but the shortest grasses, bare, and barren.
But on the right hand side, protected as it had been from the sheep, the picture was staggeringly different. The hillside was a riot of small trees, birch, rowan and juniper and blackthorn bushes.
Who built the fence? Tim had yet to find out, but the message was clear. Give nature a chance and she will restore and recover damaged landscapes. And once the landscape is restored wildlife will find it and move in.
Knepp Estate a 3,500 acre ex arable farm in Sussex is proof of this. Tim had led a team from Derbyshire Wildlife Trust in the early summer to see the pioneering and inspiring work that Charlie Burrell and his wife Isabella Tree have done in wilding their farm.
Just two examples illustrate their success, Nightingales have declined by 90% since the 1970’s across Southern England but have found Knepp and are making it a stronghold, the Emperor butterfly is flourishing there and the early morning air is full of bird song. Tim and his team were astonished and moved by the dawn chorus.
The vision for the uplands is to achieve something similar on a landscape scale for the Peak District.
To enable the landscape to recover and heal itself, to encourage once common species such as Pine Marten and red squirrels to return and thrive. And to provide a wonderful place for us, our children and grandchildren to learn about and appreciate the natural world all around us.
Tim talked about the isolation of the Derbyshire Wildlife reserves, surrounded as they often are by grouse moors and shooting estates with their traps and snares. The reserves become little refuges for nature but on too small and too fragmented a scale.
A good example of this is the Lady Bower Woods Reserve. The picture below illustrates the point. To the left of the stone wall is the Moscar Grouse Moor, to the right the DWT reserve.
But create a landscape wide approach and then these reserves become isolated no more, but become vital hot spots of wildlife that can then spread out into the wider landscape.
Of course it will all take time. There are a multitude of landowners and stakeholders to consult with and bring on board. But things are changing. Almost daily there is news of new initiatives and schemes, the recent ‘Summit to Shore’ rewilding project in Wales and the plans to restore the Caledonian Forest in Scotland to name but two.
And with the drive and vision of Derbyshire Wildlife Trust and all the other wildlife groups including the work that Buxton Civic Association is doing to create woodland habitats that encourage greater biodiversity, then a grand plan for the Peak District will not be far behind.
One day soon perhaps there will no need for a fence and we can learn how to let nature survive and thrive alongside us.
A Peak District teeming with wildlife, with wildflowers and trees and scrub, where bird song and the hum of insects is taken for granted again, and who knows what might be lurking in the undergrowth or surprise you round the next corner in the forest.
That is some vision, and some picture. It is something worth working for.
South West Peak Partnership have asked us to post details of the following walking event. Please note that this is not organised by Buxton Civic Association and any queries about the walk should be directed to the South West Peak Partnership. Contact Details can be found at the bottom of this post.
DETAILS OF THE WALK
Event Name 10,000 Years in a Day!
Start Date 15th Oct 2018 10:00am
End Date 15th Oct 2018 4:00pm
Duration 6 hours
Description 10,000 Years in a Day!
Monday 15th October 2018
Guided Walk down the Dove Valley with Dr Catherine Parker Heath our very own Cultural Heritage Officer.
This walk is for all those interested in the South West Peak, its history and archaeology, whether you are a current or potential volunteer, or not!
About the walk:
Meet at Hartington Market Place NGR: SK128603 at 10:00am to take a minibus to the start of the walk at Buxton Raceway.
Finish back at Hartington at 4:00pm (approx.)
Distance: about 8 miles, Terrain: fields, tracks, sections of road, rough ground.
Bring a packed lunch, stout footwear and suitable clothing for the weather.
We will stop for breaks and lunch en-route. Refreshments available to buy from various tea shops and other establishments in Hartington before setting off and at the end.
Toilets at Hartington Station and various tea shops and other establishments in Hartington before and after walk, but, unfortunately, not en-route.
Along the Upper Dove Valley, evidence exists of human activity that dates from the Palaeolithic to the present day. At the very edge of the South West Peak, the Dove Valley is not only a boundary between the counties of Derbyshire and Staffordshire but also between different geologies and geographies, which have informed how people have lived here in the past. Join us to find out more!
CONTACT DETAILS AND HOW TO BOOK
Booking essential as places are limited: Email SWP Cultural Heritage Officer, Dr Catherine Parker Heath catherine.parkerheath@peakdistrict.gov.uk or call on 01629 816279.
Plastic bottles, crisp packets, bits of carpet, bathing towels, the plastic wrapping from a pair of swimming trunks, paper and of course drink cans, these were just some of the items of rubbish that we found on a recent litter pick at a local beauty spot.
I had joined Karen Beresford who runs the Buxton Town Team litter picking group, to spend a couple of hours tackling the never ending problem of litter that blights our towns and our countryside.
Though there is something satisfying in picking up litter, it is frustrating to think that people drop their trash and rubbish there in the first place. It is after all a beautiful, peaceful spot. In summer full of wildflowers and bird song.
But it does not seem to matter where you go, you will find discarded rubbish. Even providing bins does not always solve the problem. Whether it’s leaving the waste from a picnic or BBQ, or throwing bottles and plastic from a vehicle, it seems as if some people just don’t care.
Out of sight out of mind, and anyway someone else will pick it up.
We cleared two big sacks of rubbish from the site. So now at least for a little while it is free of discarded plastic and wrappers. And walking there will be a pleasanter experience.
We decide that as there was still time we would tackle a small section of the Tongue lane industrial estate. This was littering on a different scale.
As well as the usual items, there were bits of engine, oil containers, nappies wrapped in plastic bags and half full bottles of liquid. Plastic sheeting lay discarded on a patch of ‘waste ground’, and shreds of plastic bag caught by the wind lay twisted round the stunted bushes.
We could only scratch the surface. There is still much more to be done as you can see from the photos above.
I could not help wondering if this little patch of waste ground could be put to much better use. Planted with fruit trees, perhaps part of Transition Buxton’s urban orchard scheme, and wildflowers to attract bees, butterflies and other insects, and a bench, it could become a little haven of tranquillity,somewhere to sit and have a sandwich, or just to relax from all the hurly burly around you.
One for the Urbitat project perhaps?
Karen is always glad to hear from new
enthusiastic litter pickers and you can contact
her by email stoop.farm@icloud.com
