I plan to follow How Beck. This cuts through Silurian and Ordovician siliceous rock (like you find in the Lake district and North Wales) - So it might reveal some good lichens.
The lowest 200m of the stream is buried under the main road and railway and flat last field as it exits into the Ribble at 202m
I discover the path beside it is part of the Ribble Way
I discover the path beside it is also part of the A Pennine Journey trail
Well Well. Perhaps someone will do a search for one of these Long distance Paths and end up on this post .. if so - Welcome
Welcome - enjoy learning a little about the lichens
The Ribble Way makes a detour at Stainforth and leaves the Ribble and follows the How Beck up to Moorhead Lane at 347 m, and then turns left along the Moorhead Lane down and to Helwith Bridge and the Ribble again.
The original path continues up the ridge between the valleys on either side on what is essentially the south west spur of Penyghentm right to the summit of Penyghent 5km away:
To the east is Silverdale which after Dalehead becomes Penyghent Gill (The valley pass between Stainforth and Halton Gill at the top of Littondale which joins Wharfedale.) To the west is the main Ribble Valley.
As the stream makes its steep descent it cuts through Silurian and Ordovician rocks. These are siliceous rocks - as found in the Lake District and Wales - and they can support different lichens to millstone grit and sandstone - the main other types of acid rock round here.
I had discovered good lichens on the rocks on the lower part of this beck earlier - in SD8167 (and the top corner of SD 8267 looks as though it has potential) with Dog lichen in the shallow turf- Peltigera hymenina . On the vertical faces of rocks near the stream were Varicellaria lactea and Lecanora rupicola and Xanthoparmelia conspersa
I walk up through the two and a half fields from Stainforth - up and up, over the Anglian lynchets (ridges)
The first day (15 Oct) I look at two very small areas:
Area 1 : The 20 square m or on the rocks beside the stream
Area 2: 200m further up the patch in the 3 sq m of wall at the stile -
In area 1 I play my tin whistle beside the stream and take photos of the valley below - right as far as Pendle Hill in the distance.
I notice a hiker with a huge rucksack climbing the footpath. the Ribble Way - I never catch him but I do proceed to Area 2 - the dry stone wall which has a mixture of rocks
The two areas together reveal 34 different species of lichen.
"This will give me an orange dot to put on my map." I calculate. (over 19 is yellow, over 29, orange, over 41 brown over 56 red) "But if I can record another 7 species, that will get it up to 41, and I can change it to an brown dot"
All the species I have found are typical of acid rock, with half a dozen extra that are growing on some limestone in the wall.
Over the wall in the distance I can see a dozen or rather scrappy willow trees, growing amongst the newly planted tree guarded saplings. "Ah they are sure to have the common pollution tolerant lichens that grow on nearly every tree. I will come back and record them another time."--------------------------------------------
Day 2:
Thursday 21 Oct is another sunny day. - How Beck and How Beck Plantation
I set off rather late - after 3pm, and tack my way up the steep field with its lynchets, picking up waxcaps as I stagger up.
Revisiting the stream edge, I find a two new lichens - but I do not know their names. Huh .What use is that!! Plus a Collema (Black Jelly Lichen) that I put in a bag.
So up to the field with the trees. Here I find the five lichens I was expecting plus a couple of sprigs of Ramalina fastigiata. the Physcia tenella has a pink lichenicolous fungus on it which turns out to be Ilosporiensis christianensis
In 15 years time when all the young saplings in this field have grown there will be several more lichens.
In the evening I look at the Collema - I have to key it out.
It is Collema flaccidum - Whey! - I took a video of that at Kirkstone Pass last month. A new record for the Hectad. I hope.
I enter the lichens on my spreadsheet. 41 species total. Yes. I can mark that monad as brown, not orange. It is now the fourth most diverse monad out of the 28 monads I have so far attempted. Not bad for 2 and a half visits.
But the number of habitats left to explore is low.
there is more stream running through the marshy plantation. There are another lm or 2 of wall. But there are no more big trees, no limestone bedrock, no buildings with mortar. Just lots of grass and rushes.
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Friday evening 22nd.
I get out the specimens I had brought back and copydexed some onto card and worked out what three more are.
Now at 44 species it is the third equal most highly scoring monad out of the 28 monads I have recorded.
Wed 26th
I show photos of some of my unknown species to the BLS "Lichen Chat and Improvement Group" - with abject apologies that there is no scale on the photo nor K or C test.
It is suggested that this one growing on siliceous rock right next to the stream (which I had though looked like a Dermatocarpon) might be Dermatocarpon meiophyllizum .
I look at the distribution map and see it has been recorded in the stream below the Norber erratics i.e. similar rock and height.
No luck with suggestions for the other species.
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Day 3: Thursday 28th Oct: Goat Lane
I have been indoors a few days, I need some fresh air.. even if the thick grey clouds make everywhere look very dark at even 10.am So on Thursday morning I drive through Stainforth and up the road (towards Halton Gill) labelled Goat Lane on the OS map, half a mile until I am just inside SD8268 - this time at the SE corner of the monad.
Trees!. Several mature Beech, over the wall to the south plus a couple of hawthorn, ash, sycamore and elder beside the road to the north..
I look at the trees/bushes to the norht. I can now add Ramalina farinosa and Phlyctis argena to my list. Surely this Hawthorn tree can produce a Ramalina fraxinea - It is exposed and high up in a similar place to where I have seenothers. No.
The wall is an excellent habitat to study. If I bend down I can shelter from the wind.
The wall is old and the slate fragmenting - I can take specimens simply by putting my fingernail in the slate.
I put my head up above the parapet/ wall - whoo it is still windy. I bend down again and add more common lichens of acid walls to my list - Cladonia pyxidata, Ochrolechia parella (I think)
I find a small place where mortar (old fashioned mortar" has been put into the wall ) "Yes" - Verrucaria muralis - I take a photo, retreat to the Car and descend to civilisation. and shelter from the wind
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Five new species. That brings my total to 50! - and is the second highest Total (My winning total is 62 from Huntworth Common)
I need to get another 6 species for my dot to turn red at 56. Well that is not impossible!
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Day 4: Fri 29 Oct. Goat Lane Waterfall
I really must sort the specimens I brought back yesterday.
But by 3.30pm I see bright sunlight between the showers.. perhaps goat Lane will be brighter today and reveal more species - O set off at 4pm (far too late..) and drive up Goat Lane, to the same parking place.
I have noticed it says "waterfall" on the map - at the line between SD8268 and SD8267. So I walk up to the boundary and look at the wall and stream at and just north of the waterfall.
This is at the same height - 300m - as my How Beck site. This stream does not have a name on the map. Let's call it Goat Lane Waterfall stream now. Later I look across the pasture and note the old deep tracks and ditches and holloways winding their way up the hill - The past efforts to make a road up such a steep hill - before the current road was eventually walled and then tarmacked. People could not just nip up in their car.
Day 5: Goat Lane on foot - Thur 4 November
I am lacking exercise and it is a pleasant afternoon so I go for a walk /jog (oh my knees) stroll to Goat Lane - It is just over 3km there and 3 km back - total >6km of 4 miles.
but I don't have a camera. The sun is getting very low and the wall is perpendicular to the sun so neither side gets sunlight. I discover that the tiny bit of mortar I had seen in the wall on my last trip was not mortar, but concrete, and it did not have any Verrucaria muralis in it. at all. I picked up a possible different Cladonia. I took a sample of a lichen form the bark of a sycamore (?) tree in the north side of the road.
Day 6: Sun 6 November - Mature trees - adjacent and south of Goat Lane
It is not windy or rainy - just mildly sunny and mildly damp. I will drive up to Goat Lane again.
I go through the gate into the field south/down from the road whihc have half a dozen mature beech trees and 1 mature ash (dying) and 1 mature lime.
My excurssion into the field is rewarded:
Ramalina fastigiata (1 peice) - on Ash
Candelaria concolor one piece on Ash
Lecanora expallens - on Beech - I think I had also brought that back from rock from the wall below it last time.
the beech trunks have a lot on them - Ramalina farinacea, Hypotrachyna afrorevoluta L expallens, Parmela saxatilis, a little Arthonia radiata.
There was an interesting fungus in the soil but coming from the Beech root
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