Every trip can be a nature field trip -
Open your eyes.
Looking at West Yorkshire
- through the handlens of history,
- the love of lichens
- the comradeship of public speaking
Skip down to the section that most interests you. The sections are:
- What was the "Let's Talk Farming" event at Settle?
- Did you know that Young Farmers do Public Speaking?
- Speech Competition at Skipton Craven Speakers Club - (title "Let's Talk Farming")
- Trip to Huddersfield - woollen (and cotton) mill town of the West Riding
- Lichens in SE162165 (at the Tolson Museum) in an area with relatively few British Lichen Society records
- What is there at the Tolson Museum, Huddersfield?
- The "New Church" aka Swedenborgian denomination
- The Dales Area Speakers Club Competition, held at the New Church, Dalton, Huddersfield
- The CCM Next Generation Young Farmers Club Event at Skipton Auction Mart
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"Let's Talk Farming" event at Settle, North Yorkshire
In September 2025, St John's Methodist Church held a day "Let's Talk Farming".
This was the third "Community Day" that St John's Eco-group had organised - the previous two being "Let's talk Rubbish" and "Let's talk Local." We had talks by local farmers and people connected with farming including Farmers Community Network and Fram Nurse. It was a successful and happy day.
(My paternal grandfather had been a farmer and I remember visiting the farm till I was 8. Farmers have links up and down the Pennines via the auction marts .. but I have very few links with the local farmers now - so this would be a chance to meet some.)
Young Farmers Public Speaking
A highlight of the afternoon was the performance by seven smart, serene, self-composed young ladies from Rathmell Young Farmers Club, (aged c.14 to 24) demonstrating examples of their Young Farmers Club Speech Competition events
(I am an enthusiast of Craven Speakers Club at Skipton- part of the Association of Speakers Clubs ASC).
I made a write up of this "Let's talk farming" event. .. Not sure if it ever got used..
Speech Competition at Skipton Craven Speakers Club
Then in December 2024 we had our Craven Speakers Club annual Speech competition at Skipton.
Craven Speakers Club Skipton has about 15 members and is one of over 60 speakers clubs belonging to the Association of Speakers Clubs.
Well, I had ready-made content for a speech, didn't I? I would use it. And I would give it the same title: "Let's talk farming"
How to make it into a speech?
I thinned the content down considerably and concentrated on the "What's in it for me?" thoughts of my audience. I tried very hard to get it into three parts followed by a summary and concluding exhortation. I found out about Young Farmers Clubs in the Skipton area. (As opposed to the Settle Area who had talked at Settle) Videoed it on my camera. Read and dissected the judges' mark sheet several times. (Hmmm- I shouldn't be giving away my secret tips should I?)
Then lo and behold I won our club competition.
The prize? - the opportunity / responsibility to represent our club at the Dales Area competition, along with Sachin the runner-up in our competition
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The Dales Area Competition of the ASC was to be held on 1st February at Huddersfield.. 50 miles away by car from my house. I live in the west of North Yorkshire five miles from the Lancashire border.. Huddersfield is 40 miles away SE as the crow flies down the Pennines
Huh.
Initially, I was not overjoyed. Mostly because I knew that even if I came 2nd in this competition I would then have to go to the Eastern Region Competition at Bramhope, Leeds (considerably closer actually), in March, and even have to write a new speech for it. There are lots of old hands in the Region far better than me who would then knock me out. Also, I have so, so many interests and activities, all needing publicity and social media backup - I just cannot afford the time.
However I also did well in our club Topics competition in January and so I now had two reasons to go.
On 30 January I swotted up on the internet about Huddersfield and about Young Farmers Clubs in the Huddersfield Area.
I even phoned up the Yorkshire Federation of Young Farmers Clubs office (at Harrogate) to find out more about Young Farmers Clubs in the Huddersfield Area. - There were four, but I think she said the Calderdale one was the most active. "Oh they are busy " the lady said, "They will be getting ready for the "Next Generation Event at Skipton Auction Mart" on the following day - Sunday 2nd February". Skipton Auction Mart? - I could visit that.
Trip to Huddersfield
So 1 Feb found me setting off on my adventure through geography, history, culture, lichens - by train - to Huddersfield.. a city I had never ever visited before. Down the Ribble Valley then down the Aire Valley, then across and up the Calder and the rivers Colne to where the Colne and Home join at Huddersfield. All these Mill towns. All situated on the rivers because they supplied abundant soft water for the then cotton mills, needed for water power before the industrial revolution. The man who sold me my railway ticket in Settle the day before said he had been told that at one time 100 years ago there were more Rolls Royces in Huddersfield than in London.
On the train Settle to Leeds I met friends Philip and Chris from our church Eco-group, going on a weekend by train to Scarborough (They were delighted that I would be telling more people about our farming day.. They had once lived in Huddersfield. They told me to look out for the statue of Harold Wilson in front of the Grade 1 listed Railway station.
At Leeds railway station - I took a quick photo from the Railway Station of the start of the Leeds Liverpool Canal: This is from just beyond the ticket barrier on the main bridge that crosses all the platforms
Actually Huddersfield is only classified as a town though it is Yorkshire's 6th biggest town/city. It has a population of 141,692 which is big compared to Settle and Giggleswick (4000 total), and big compared to Ripon (population 17,000 which is England's third smallest city.
For 35 miles (from Skipton southwards) I had been travelling with views of rows and rows of grey terraced houses - Lowri style, plus scattered large Victorian Mills (their tall chimneys now gone), and other parts with big Victorian houses - built with the profits from the mills. There was rubbish thrown or blown on some of the railway track-side. Town after town merging into each other. Of course the train was in the valley so I did not see the gritstone heather moors and rough grassland and sheep pasture above. The weather was grey and cloudy
I travelled by train as far as Brighouse, from where I viewed the last 5 miles from the top of a double-decker bus, as Huddersfield Station is currently closed for renovations.
I was now in Kirklees. I had heard of Kirklees as a name, but did not know where/what it was. I discover it is one of five Metropolitan boroughs which make up present day West Yorkshire. It is the most southerly one - (though remember there is now a South Yorkshire including Sheffield, Rotherham and Doncaster which is south of West Yorkshire). It was named after Kirklees Priory, which is claimed to be site of Robin Hood's death, situated midway between Huddersfield and Dewsbury. The priory was located within the present-day Kirklees Park estate, most of which actually lies in the neighbouring borough of Calderdale.
At Huddersfield Station they let me inside the empty station to go to the Ladies loo - which was lovely and warm and lovely and clean because no-one was in using the station. I took the opportunity to balance my camera on a ledge and video a final version of the speech... hmm..still too long at 8min 40 sec for a 6-8 min speech.
After a quick photo of Harold .....
and another
I caught a taxi for the 1.5 miles to the Tolson Museum, which is situated in the same monad (1 km square) as "The New Church, Dalton" - the location of our speech competition.
Lichens in SE162165 at the Tolson Museum
The Tolson Museum was not open till midday - which was great for me at 10.45. I could do a lichen survey of the surrounding walls and grassy parkland.
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| Candelaria concolor lichen making a big yellow splash on the trunk of the Field Maple. This species is spreading northward. It is one that grows where there is reactive nitrogen (nitrogenoxides)in the air. |
Why do lichen surveys? I have (by 12 Feb) sent my results for the monad (1km square) to the British Lichen Society. They will be added to the interactive map Looking at the map we can see the distribution of lichens in the UK, with respect to location and with respect to time. Lichens have changed dramatically over the last 50 years - The sulphur dioxide pollution from factories and coal burning is gone so trunks are less acid than they used to be. Acid loving lichens are decreasing. But nitrogen oxides are now a major pollutant. (From fertilizer, slurry, car fumes, chicken factories.) Many of the lichens I found at Tolson are nitrogen oxide indicators. The BLS maps show a dearth of records - a "white hole" in this part of Yorkshire .. because there is there are a lack of records on this part of the map.  |
| This Field Maple had an amazingly dense coating of pale grey Physcia adscendens, with more bits of yellow Candelaria concolor and also one or two tiny patches -- see below of Punctellia subrudecta |
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| Physcia adscendens, with more bits of yellow Candelaria concolor and also one or two tiny patches -- of Punctellia subrudecta The under-surface of the lobes of the thallus are pale, not dark as in the similar looking Parmelia sulcata (also present nearby in one tiny patch) |
I had established the night before by visiting the Interactive Map on the BLS website that no-one had ever sent in records from this particular 1km square; and indeed within the whole hectad SE11 (10 x 10 km square), only 65 species had been recorded; SE1616 is at the last "d" of Huddersfield on this map.
The three highest scoring monads SE1612, SE1014 and SE1010 had only 22, 23 and 26 species recorded respectively. The latest date that any species had been recorded was 1995 i.e. 30 years ago.. and they had not recorded (the extremely common) Xanthoria parietina in two of the monads. or indeed in any monad since the 1995 hectad.
Is this just forgetfulness for a very common species? Or was it really absent?
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| Lecanora muralis on wood now, rather than the ground as seen earlier |
So how did I get on?
I was able to name 20 species, guess two other species but would like to confirm them before sending records in, and have packets of 3 other unknown species.
For the record, on this visit I found no Parmelia saxatilis, Arthonia radiata, Hyperphyscia adglutinata, No Collemaceae.
Punctellia subrudecta, Parmelia sulcata Ramalina farinacea were very rare - limited to one to five tiny specimens of each on trunks. None seen on fallen branches.
The two monads had records of Lecanora conizaeoides. This is a species that was very common 60 years ago when everywhere was polluted with sulphur dioxide from coal fires amongst other things. My monad had none of this. But it was not recorded in the hectad result either.
The Tolson Museum and the History of the Wool and Cotton Industries.
curator at the museum in 1922. His amazing 'Bird Gallery' can still be seen .
There is lots to be seen in the museum, including the history of the textile industry.
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| Inside the Tolson Museum |
The New Church, Dalton
I arrived at The New Church, Dalton, a quarter of a mile away, on time (just) The New Church (I had researched) is the Swedenborgian church. Emanuel Swedenborg (1688–1772). There is lots on Wikipedia- He wrote about science and engineering for the first half of his life, and religion in the second half. He was a polymath. This building was erected in 1825 and enlarged in 1850-51 It is a grade II listed building.
Context:
In comparison
John Wesley lived 1703-1791.
The First Industrial Revolution was from 1760 to 1850 and the Second Industrial Revolution or Technological Revolution between 1870 and 1914. In the first Revolution people started using water power and then steam power. Wool
James Bolton, The Father of modern mycology in Britain lived in nearby Halifax (8 miles from Huddersfield) 1735 – 1799. Well he wrote the first English-language work devoted to fungi, Bolton's three-volume An History of Fungusses growing about Halifax, published 1788–1790,
In 1867 the Swiss botanist Schwendener announced to the scientific world his hypothesis that lichen was formed by two separate organisms, a fungus and an alga.
The Swedish Biologist Carl Linnaeus (23 May 1707 – 10 January 1778). formalised binomial nomenclature.
And in Feb 2025, I wandered round the trees and walls at Tolson museum and collected lichen records. .. In ten years this blog will be dated.
I sent them to Janet Simkin (and Brian Coppins) who will enter them in Recorder ?6? for the BLS data base. There are AI internet programmes to recognise most higher plats that are getting good now. But not yet for lichens.
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The Dales Area Speakers Club Competition:
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| The Lead judge (with orange ribbon) and the winners who will go forward to the next round. |
Jayaraj and Sachin gave me a lift back as far as Keighley, from where I caught the train to Settle.
On Sunday morning I attended Church at St John's, had coffee, and then shot off to Skipton Auction Mart.
The CCM Next Generation Young Farmers Club Event at Skipton Auction Mart.
To be continued..
article in the national Methodist Website
https://www.methodist.org.uk/about/our-stories/talking-farming/
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