Climate Walk 1 Nov 2024: Leaky Dams at Thornton in Lonsdale

We met Zoe at the Marton Arms and she led us up through three fields to the wood. It was in a very narrow gill.  

She explained that the road next to her house used to flood during very wet conditions. The Council had altered the drains beside the road but the road continued to flood - in fact it got worse.

Finally the people near the road formed a group and got permission from the farmer and built some leaky dams. 

I was intrigued to see these dams.

The first part of the wood going upstream was in an area where sheep could (if allowed) have access.

We then went through a gate and here there was no access for farm animals.

Zoe explained how how they did nearly all the work themselves. They paid an experienced dam builder to come and show them how to do it and provide some of the materials. This was shortly before Covid.

The banks got steeper and bramblier. We had to keep criss-crossing the stream - fine for Zoe and I in wellies, but a challenge for the other two in hiking footwear.  

Finally as it got even steeper and bramblier we decided to climb out of the wooded gill. Once outside I saw that we had only walked up a third of the gill.. and the leaky dams continued upwards. -

I looked at the lichens on the gate and wall where we had emerged from the gill.

After I got home I noticed this tiny frilly yellow lichen in a photo. I think it is Xanthoria ucrainica, but it could be Candelaria concolor.  I wish I had done a chemical test whilst I was there - It is a long way to go back just to see whether KOH will make it turn red.

We only found one waxcap in the whole walk - on a bank near the stream

Later Zoe showed us the culvert in the village where the stream went under some houses. I am not surprised the  culvert could not take all the water under flash flood conditions. Graphs show that we have increasingly more days with a very high rain fall than we used to.   

Later she showed where the stream came out and flowed past the houses. 

She says that since the dams were built the road has not flooded.

Stream emerging form the culvert

Recuperating in the Marton Arms

Waxcaps near Helwith Bridge

Waxcaps can be found in old grassland that has NOT had lots of fertilizer applied.  Today I went on a foray with Claire Bending from the Yorkshire Waxcaps project and three other friends in Ribblesdale near Helwith Bridge. In Settle it was grey and cloudy, but four miles up the valley here, there was was blue sky and sun.

holding a Scarlet Waxcap -
( Hygrocybe coccinea)

The grass was fairly closely cropped by sheep which was excellent for the waxcaps.

Here are several yellow and orange waxcaps that I have now learned to differentiate between. I might just have lumped them as one species last year !!. Plus a couple of Pink-Gills (Entoloma) - that I still cannot name. 

We also found (though not shown here)  - Cordyceps militaris, Meadow Coral, White spindle, Yellow Spindle (possibly two types) and Black Earth-tongue, Parrot Waxcap, Snowy Waxcap, Scarlet Waxcap, Crimson Waxcap and Meadow Waxcap. So altogether I saw 13 waxcaps, maybe four Entolomas (Pink- gills) one Earthtongue and at least three spindles/clubs. 

Pink Gill -1

Pink-Gill 1 from below

The Goblet Waxcap - if you look closely it has tiny hairs on its cap

The Goblet  (pretty tiny!)

Butter waxcap - If you look at the top  middle one you see its gills are adnate... which is different to the next one...

Whereas this one, the more common yellow waxcap around Settle Hygrocybe chlorophana  has sinuate gills.

This is the Persistent Waxcap, Hygrocybe autoconica (better known as Hygrocybe persistens - but it has been discovered that it was called H autoconica first so that is now its official name) It has a viscid (sticky) cap, that is usually a bit more conical than this, and a dry stipe.

We also found Oily Waxcap Hygrocybe quieta -  that smells of oil. Its cap and stipe are greasy. Its gills are yellow to salmon pink in colour. 

We found Honey Waxcap too - though I have not got a photo of that.

We haven't quite decided what these are.

We haven't quite decided what these are.

This has almost free gills and is supposed to smell of beetroot (though I couldn't smell it) - I have forgotten its name  (coming shortly..)- but it is not Snowy or Cedar Waxap

A different Pink Gill.

I hope you enjoyed your walk with us looking at these waxcaps.

Waxcaps and water walk at Winskill Stones

Low Bentham Churchyard - Hairy Earthtongues, Waxcaps, Increase in Dog Lichen (Peltigera hymenina) -13 Nov 2022