Martin WW

Gimme Shelter(s)

Storm Otto gave us 60mph winds just 24 hours before our planned volunteer day to remove the last of the redundant shelters from the Castle end of the Cluster. Thankfully (for us) Otto had left for Denmark and we had a bright and warm morning for our planned task. Sadly only three of the fiveContinue reading “Gimme Shelter(s)”

Beavering away…

We spent Wednesday and Thursday last week learning how to construct leaky barriers at three different locations across the cluster; each where channels begin to flow in the wetter months. The idea is to let ‘normal flow’ pass through unobstructed, but temporarily hold water back during periods of high rainfall. This water is then releasedContinue reading “Beavering away…”

Help us to slow the flow this winter…

On Wednesday 9th and Thursday 10th November we will be installing leaky barriers as a part of the Yorkshire Dales Rivers Trust’s ‘Arkengarthdale Natural Flood Management’ project. Led by Rhiannon O’Connell from the Yorkshire Dales Rivers Trust, we’ll use tools and bits of trees to create leaky barriers in overland flow pathways that will helpContinue reading “Help us to slow the flow this winter…”

Size does matter

So we soon learned as many hands made light work yesterday removing tree shelters on The Cluster. Done alone, it can be a slightly soul destroying task. Done as part of a group and it immediately becomes tolerable… enjoyable even as you work together to liberate each tree from its outgrown PPE. This time ourContinue reading “Size does matter”

Woolly jumpers

You may remember that last winter we planted a lot of willow to try and stop some of The Cluster ending up in the North Sea? See here…https://heggscastlecluster.org/2022/03/11/how-was-your-day/ After the floods three years ago, a large land slip started which with every proceeding flood caused more to be washed into the Arkle and more landContinue reading “Woolly jumpers”

A little rain must fall…

But why does it have to be 5 1/2 inches in just over three hours? Three years ago today we had a bit of a shower which caused huge amounts of damage to both The Cluster and the surrounding area. TV crews flooded in (sorry) to the area to document and incorrectly report what wasContinue reading “A little rain must fall…”

A moist update.

It rained! Seriously. It did. Honest! It was therefore a bit muddy as we removed another few hundred meters of wire and posts from the Castle end of The Cluster. This fencing was erected some years ago to keep stock out of the alder woodland but floods and erosion had severely damaged it to theContinue reading “A moist update.”

Buses

You wait ages for a blog to come along… Just a reminder that we try and enter records of things seen on The Cluster (or indeed anywhere else) on https://www.inaturalist.org/home Its a simple to use app which has a feature where it attempts to identify what you’ve photographed. Anything that is recorded on The ClusterContinue reading “Buses”

Would Sophia Loren approve?

“A woman’s dress should be like a barbed-wire fence: serving its purpose without obstructing the view.” ~ Sophia Loren Saturday found a group of volunteers assembled on The Cluster in cloudy but warm conditions to bang things and pull out things. The ‘banging’ involved making sure that some of the trees we planted earlier inContinue reading “Would Sophia Loren approve?”

In Search of Ronnie and Reggies*

Last Thursday saw a team of volunteers from the Yorkshire Wildlife Trust get their feet wet in search of our native White-clawed crayfish. Some old faces re-appeared from last year’s day surveying with the Wild Trout Trust as well as some newbies to The Cluster. The lower the river the better when searching for crayfishContinue reading “In Search of Ronnie and Reggies*”