Doris Cairns

20 Feb 2018 - Coffee Morning at St John's Settle

 Doris Cairns.

A few of you will know my good friend Doris Cairns, who was a great support to me in many of my local botanical exploits.  She was a great inspiration to me - in her determination and success to keep active and fit - in her interest in wildlife - and in her enthusiastic and happy nature. Sadly she died on Sunday 1 June, after a short illness. At the age of 93, two months short of being 94.

(I have lots of pictures but will do the writing first)

I first knew Doris when she lived in Ingleton, but these last two years she lived in a Yorkshire Housing bungalow at Mill Close, Settle. Before Ingleton she lived near Tosside and before that she worked in Australia, having sailed out on one of the £10 tickets.  

Some of you will have seen her two books:" Wildlife in a Churchyard (Giggleswick) and "Wildflowers of the Churchyards" (Ingleton and Chapel Le Dale) 

Doris studied biology at Manchester University and attended a university field course at Malham Tarn Field Centre in 1951. She showed me a picture of the group there. One of her university teachers was Peter Greig-Smith - who 25 years later was my PhD supervisor. Small world!   

She taught games and PE in the UK. Then she worked in Australia for many years teaching children, including (which she particularly liked) in the Island schools of the Torres Strait, between Cairns in the north of Australia and Papua New Guinea.  (She has a book about that too). She gained her pilot's licence. Her father was in the RAF and was in a team that made the first journey flying the length of Africa from north to south stopping at various places en route. Doris had a holiday once following this route. She started writing her memoirs but only got part way through. Her good friend Cynthia Hardyman has typed up the first 53 handwritten pages.

I have just seen some of the pictures of her early life - what an active life she had.. 

The funeral will be at St Alkelda's Church, Giggleswick at 11.30am on Thursday 19 June.

Here are some recent pictures of Doris. I will dig out some older ones later.

Coffee Morning at Settle Methodist Church with Revd Stephen Dawson and Revd  (Julie Cox.)

Mon 7 April 2025 - A Monday Lunch at the Hub/Public Living Room held at Settle Quakers,
Isabel came for the Folly to show some of the old items held there.  Doris on right.

Doris (right) with Mary Taylor from Bentham Walking Group and Revd Timothy Fox at Low Bentham churchyard - 10 Oct 2024

Talking with Bishop Nick at Holy Ascension, Settle, 27 April 2025

 the morning before Liverpool won (The Premier League )

4 May 2025 Horton Lambing Service

Judith, Cynthia, Doris, Viv  enjoying coffee in Keighley - A very happy day at Keighley on Fri 9 May 2025 when Doris could chat with Viv - about old times when they sailed out to Australia together.

 Fri 9 May 2025 -Cynthia and Doris visit Cynthia's garden

14 Feb 2018 Craven Conservation Group workshop
using a vegetative key (Poland) for identifying plants

More to come when I get time.

Introduction to Lichens at Linton Churchyard Grassington on Acid Rock, Basic Rock and Trees: June

As part of Churches Count on Nature Week 2025 (7-15 June) we held "An Introduction to Lichens" workshop at Linton Churchyard, near Grassington, 13.45 to 15.45 Sat 7 June. This was a follow on to the workshop held on 5 April. 

Here is the article which appeared in the Craven Herald:

I wanted to see which lichens beginners would notice by themselves.

Our aim was to find
five striking lichens on siliceous rock (acid) ,
five on basic rock, and
five on trees.

On the first workshop - 5 April - 8 people had attended plus three more experienced people who went on to write a species list of 56 species found.  These were (we assume) still there on 7-15 June and will be sent in to the Churches Count on Nature project.

On 7 June two completely new people came (one from Grassington and one from Skipton ) plus the two second-timers from Grassington - one from the Churchyard Management Team, and one from the Upper Wharfedale Field Society. 

What is a lichen? 

Many people have become interested in lichens recently having heard about the mysterious symbiotic association of a fungus and an alga. (Symbiotic means the two organisms help each other). Each of te almost 2000 lichens in the UK has a different fungus, (which gives the lichen its name) - but they often use the same algae maybe a choice of 100 or so.

 

How do you pronounce lichen?

In universities they pronounce it "Liken" - but many other people say "Litchen" to rhyme with kitchen 

It is not a moss - Mosses are actually green plants with tiny leaves.  

I reminded the group that each lichen is made out of a fungus (which gives the lichen its name, and its structure) and one or more algae which can photosynthesise and thus give the lichen sugars. ("The algae" can include certain bacteria which can also photosynthesise). By helping each other the fungus and alga allow the "organism" so formed to grow in dry bare places where nothing else can grow. Each lichen is a symbiotic community of two organisms helping each other.  So lichens are really tiny micro-ecosystems because they contain two or more species - the fungus and the alga,

The body of the lichen is called the thallus. The three main structural forms of lichens are:

Crustose (making a crust on the surface)

Foliose or leafy ( you can get your finger nail under the lichen)

Fruticose, or shrubby: The lichen is attached to its substratum by one point (the holdfast) and then it is branched.

I set the task of:-

"Can you find and show me 

Five different species on acid gravestones and rocks (such as sandstone or slate) 

Five different species on basic (alkaline) rocks such as limestone or cement or mortar

Five different species on trees?

This is what we came up with: (for most of the lichens I include a common name and a point of interest)

We stopped two graves in from the entrance gate: at the perimeter of grave next to  the path and gravestones nearby; 

Acid Rocks - sandstone grave edging and tombstones

1. Map Lichen (Rhizocarpon geographicum)  This has been sent out into outer space by the Russians on a sputnik and returned and continued growing.
   
   
   
   
   

   

   Our first grave.  Pointing to a tiny bright green patch of "Map Lichen" 
   Mid right you can also see the
   big pale grey patch of our second lichen - "Cigarette Ash lichen" 

   
   Cigarette Ash Lichen - Porpidia tuberculosa:  This has a big grey thallus (body) which has a half cm pale band round the edge and have navy blue dots (soralia) making the central part look dark)
2. 
   

   

   Cigarette ash lichen:  Porpidia tuberculosa

   
   
   
   
   
3. Golden Speck Lichen Candelariella vitellina: This has lemon yellow dots and a few yellow apothecia (round jam-tartlike reproductive bodies 1.5mm across) and it does  not go red with KOH - alkali. This told me it must be an acid rock.
   
   

   

   Candelariella vitellina - Golden Speck Lichen - This is a very close-up picture 

   
   
   
4. Lecanora soralifera. (No English name - possibly "Rim-lichen-with-soralia" Pastel green with (under the hand lens) some much lighter c 1mm areas. The light areas are soralia - "holes" where the contents of the crustose lichens can escape as a sort of powder and blow away and start new lichens. It grows on the top of many gritstone and sandstone walls in this area. We found it on an upright gravestone.
   
   
   

   

   Looking at Map Lichen (yellow green) on an adjacent tombstone mostly covered by Lecanora soralifera

   
   
   
5. 
   

   

   Pointing to Map Lichen - Rhizocarpon geographicum. The writing on the tombstone is outlined with Lecanora soralifera
   

   
    

   

   Lecanora soralifera - looks greener than this in real life.
   This close up was not on the grave in the picture.
   
   

   
   

1. Crottle or Stony Rag: Parmelia saxatilis: This grey Leafy lichen has several common names including Crottle and Stony Rag, and was used for dyeing.  Under a hand lens you can see the central darker part has lots of tiny "fingers" about 0.5 to 1mm long. These can break off and spread the lichen.  Parmelia saxatilis turns yellow when KOH is applied.

Parmelia saxatilis  (foreground) on tomb in front of church

Parmelia saxatilis  (foreground) on tomb in front of church

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After those five ,I did get carried away showing them more lichens on acid rock. -showing them 
a) Trapelia coarctata - turns red with C (bleach) 

b) Rhizocarpon reductum (paired with Rhizocarpon geographicum in the foldout Churchyard Lichens sheet)

c) Blastenia (Caloplaca)-crenularia - deep rust red fruiting bodies

d) An unknown.. Oh I wish I knew what it was)

Mystery lichen growing on horizontal surface near base of a stepped gravestone-

It had a dark thallus but I think it was drying a lighter grey.

The scattered reproductive bodies were very very tiny. 

I applied C (top left) which might have gone slightly red, but it did not mark on a white a tissue.

 K negative.

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2. Basic rocks:

(basic means alkaline - the opposite of acid and includes rocks such as limestone, marble, cement and moratar) 

Natural limestone boulder used as gravestone.

1.  Caloplaca flavescens  Yellow pleated limestone lichen (my name)
2. Verrucaria nigrescens   Black Verrucaria
3. Circinea calcarea (formerly Aspicilia calcarea) Limestone sunken-Rim Lichen
4. Bagliettoa parmigera s. lat. (Bagliettoa baldensis, Verrucaria baldensis) - "White Verrucaria with very tiny black dots"

At this point we ran out of really obviously different lichens on this particular rock. We went to the church itself which had acid rocks held together by basic mortar - but it was difficult for novices to distinguish which substrate was which - (I realise that, because I now  know many of the lichens, I can guess the substrate.)

I am thinking of adding Caloplaca citrina  sens lat. - this looks like a yellow powder till you examine it closely. It turns red with KOH (Alkali) 

This is an amalgamation of several different Caloplaca species:   sens lat means in the wide sense. 

Other candidates include Protblastenia rupestris, Lecanora albescens and Aspicilia contorta - as they are all species that con be found on cement or mortar (a habitat that can usually be found in a churchyard) - but they do not "Stand out"  and are hard for beginners to notice. 

The group discovered a beautiful "Blue lichen" which turned out to be streaks of stuff/mortar impregnated with copper salts just below a window with a copper grill.

Turquoise - pale blue on the wall (bottom right) must be due to copper salts coming from the metal grill.  Some of the darker blacker streaks may be Cyanobacteria (Blue-green-bacteria) and the light streaks in between, where there is too much metal pollution for the blue-green bacteria to grow.

3. On Trees

One young Rowan tree to the SW corner of the church

1. Xanthoria parietina Common Yellow Lichen; Maritime Sunburst Lichen. (My name: yellow bird-perch lichen)
2. Parmelia sulcata   Hammered Shield Lichen
3. Ramalina farinacea  Farinose Cartilage Lichen 
4. Physcia tenella: Little Ciliated lichen (Cilia are hairlike/rootlike projections coming from the side of this tiny grey leafy lichen.)
5. Arthonia radiata:  This is crustose with tiny black radiating ink blot shaped fruiting bodies. I would call this "Ink blot" or "Star" or "Asterisk" Lichen

All these five lichens (and especially 1,4,5) are ones which will grow in air that has "reactive nitrogen compounds" - nitrogen oxides, ammonia and dust rich in fertilizer. These all act like fertilizer.  - They come from slurry, from fertilizer, from traffic fumes. They are in the air most of England and southern Scotland. 

Examining the Mountain Ash at Linton Churchyard

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This was the advert.

4. Below: a few pictures from the session on 5 April

Examing lichens on 5 April 2025 at Linton churchyard

Is this a black lichen or a Cyanobactria? Or a carbon stain.

Bioblitz at Kilnsey Park Estate - First half held on Fri 30 May

 - Programme here: https://www.neyedc.org.uk/c2n

The first half went well.  

On the wildlife walk at 6pm we introduced ourselves (see later) and took the short cut across the field from the Village Hall to the Kilnsey Trout farm/Park..  . Initially I invited the group to look at three members of different groups - Three grasses.. Then three lichens.. Then Derek caught insects in his sweep net  and Penny caught moths 

Common Carpet

we learned stories about these creatures 

 We learned how to recognise male Clegs (their eyes are close together with no gap between them as in the female's eyes) Male Clegs are relatively hard to find. It is only the females that suck blood.

Haematopota pluviatilis - The Notch-Horned Cleg 

  

We saw a Spring Cranefly, (This has beautiful green eyes when alive)

Spring Crane Fly Tipula vernalis

 and later a Furry Drone Fly.

Eristalis intricaria, sometimes called the Furry Dronefly, is a European species of hoverfly. It is a furry bee mimic

  

Penny showed us a Spindle tree attacked by spindle moth caterpillars.

Initially the group comprised c. 5 locals who had heard about the event including a primary school aged child, 5 people from the NEYEDC, 5 specialists (lichens, moths, insects, spiders /beetles etc) and a few more.

Some of the group disappeared off to set up Moth Traps

 ready for tomorrow, and to put out night cameras for recording animals that may walk past overnight. 

Setting up a night camera

Pitfall traps and a Malaise trap (like a tent) were set up to catch insects.

We walked as far as the edge of the flush/meadow where some of us may return on Saturday for the guided flower walk. We ticked off three sedges (Pendulous sedge, Hairy Sedge and Carnation Sedge) and two fungi (Turkey tails and Stereum rugosum) and two Rushes (Compact Rush and Hard Rush)  More than three trees (Salix alba)

White Willow - Salix alba 

 and lots of flowers and another three grasses.

We returned to the Village Hall, had cups of tea and snacks we had brought. 

Then Tony gave an introduction to the bat walk he was leading -" I don't know if we will find bats - I don't know what bats we will find - but that is what makes it so exciting." (By now another six to ten people had arrived - )

I left them, setting off at 9.30pm, with six bat detectors amongst them.

I wanted to come home and be refreshed for tomorrow (and write this) 

I had recorded 29 lichens the previous Sunday, and it turned out got the total to 42 by the end of Saturday. Would I be able to get up to 50 By Saturday afternoon in the one monad (1 km square)?

Part 2 to be written up someday soon...

 

Day 25a of 31 Days Wild - 25 May 2025: Lichens and Preparations for the Kilnsey Park Estate BioBlitz on Fri 30and Sat 31 May - Pertusaria pertusa

My best find for me whilst exploring Kilsney Park Estate was the Pepperpot Lichen - Perusaria pertusa growing on an Ash trunk

Each rounded wart has several "holes" in it which are the sunken apothecia (fruiting bodies) where fungal spores are produced. and so looks like a pepperpot.

Whilst not rare in Britain as a whole, the distribution map shows that it is absent from much of the midlands and north of England -  areas which housed the industrial revolution.

On Sun 25 May I had come to Kilnsey Park SD9767 to prepare for the Bioblitz to be held on Friday 30 May from 4pm to Sat 31 May 4pm.

All are welcome - experts and enthusiasts to help record and beginners to learn from the guided walks that are being held 

You can read about Kilnsey Park Estate here

I met Clare Langrick of NEYEDC, Tony Serjeant of UpperWharfdale Field Society and Jamie of Kilnsey Park Estate.

 

Pertusaria pertusa

Pepperpot Lichen: - Pertusaria pertusa

Pertusaria pertusa on the Ash trunk above the stream.

Distribution of Pertusaria pertusa 

Pepperpot Lichen - From British Lichen Society Website May 2025

I am to lead a guided walk on Lichens on Sat 31 May from10am to 11am. 

 I would recommend arriving at the Kilnsey Village Hall (See map) about 9am - to find space to park. And then come into the Kilnsey Park for 9.20 am to see the results of the moth trapping overnight. Then you will be ready for the lichen walk at 10am.  There is a cafe and loos at Kilnsey Park/Trout Farm.

(At 11am there will be a mosses walk led by Steve Heathcote of the British Bryological Society . Then other activities as in the programme here.

I hope I will have time to show people the fascinating grey foliose (leafy)  lichens growing on the margin of the notice board here:

Hypogymnia tubulosa

Punctelia subrudecta

Parmelia sulcata (on the left anyway)

Several of the trees near the lake and towards the entrance  had a lot of lichens growing on the trunks, including two yellow lichens on this Poplar tree:

Two yellow lichens on this Poplar tree.

The big golden yellow one is Xanthoira parietina (Common Yellow Sunburst Lichen is one of its many English names - I call it Yellow Bird Perch Lichen).
At the bottom in the middle of the picture above is a much tinier lemon yellow lichen with a very frilly structure - see below

This is called Candelaria concolour. 

Candelaria concolor used to be found only in the the south of England but it is spreading rapidly throughout Britain. This could be because of Global Warming, but much more likely because it is a lichen that grows in areas where the air has a lot of "reactive nitrogen chemicals" (chemicals from Fertilizer, from slurry, from car exhaust). By sending in records lichenologists are able to track its spread.

It is interesting that only 4 species have been recorded so far on the British Lichen Society Distribution map in this 1km square (in 2018) and that this Candelaria concolour was one of the four species reported.  See map

Two pictures of another lichen which goes red when a dot of KOH is put on it.  And a feather.

See more posts about lichens