Description
This very special event is designed for nature lovers who want to learn more about the environment around them.
Dr. Madeline Holloway is a leading ecologist, a Chartered Environmentalist, who holds a BSc, MSc, MA and a PhD in various ecology topics! Dr. Madeline will be on hand throughout your stay and has designed this event to help people focus on the wonders that nature has to offer. Dr. Madeline is specialist survey licence holder for bats, great crested newts and barn owls, whilst also being incredibly knowledgeable about birds and flora (flowers and plants).
Agenda:
Sunday 2nd June 2024
2pm – 7pm: Arrival & pitch-up
Monday 3rd June 2024
5.30am: Bird walk – listen to the dawn chorus, identify the birds, learn why they’re present, which are visiting vs residents. Take a stroll through the woods with Dr Madeline Holloway, Chartered Ecologist and an expert in UK birds. This 2 hour experience is great for any nature lover, especially amateur bird watchers. Dr Madeline says: “We’ll be walking slowly through the woods, listening and looking out for the breeding and territory calls of our resident breeding birds, such as song thrush, mistle thrush and many others at this time of year. We may also catch glimpses and hear the calls of early summer migrant breeding birds, including warblers such as chiffchaffs and blackcaps just arrived in from the Mediterranean and partly south of the Sahara as well as willow warblers that have arrived from tropical Africa. Its a glorious time of year to be out early in the morning – the trees are not yet fully out so you can easily see and hear all our birds in full chorus. ” – 2 hours
8.00am: Breakfast – included – overnight oats (vegan option available)
10.00am: Woodland walk – a close up lens on the flora within the woodland
12noon: Lunch (not included)
1.30pm: Local area walk – explore the nature and ecology of the local area, looking at ecology corridors and different ecosystems. This will include study of local wetland for Greater Crested Newts.
5.00pm: Early dinner (food included) – wholesome food, with options for Vegetarians, Vegans
6.30pm: Newt survey – this will include looking at a variety of newt terrestrial (grassland, scrub and woodland) and breeding habitats (wetland and ponds). We’ll also be setting some overnight, newt-friendly, traps to catch newts so that we can see them close-up before releasing them on Tuesday morning. This will take 2-3 hours.
8.45pm: Bat Study – Begin the bat study by starting a general discussion about British bats and their behaviour. Just before sunset at 21.31 we’ll start watching out for the first bats to emerge from their day roosts. From then on we’ll catch glimpses of bats flying and will also listen out for a whole variety of bat calls using a variety of ‘bat detectors’. Bats emit a huge diversity of bat echolocation signals through which they search and capture prey and avoid collision with obstacles when flying at night. All the ‘bat detectors’ we’ll be using have been designed to pick up (and record) this diversity of bat echolocation signals, convert them into sounds that humans can hear and identify which bat species has been recorded.
Tuesday 4th June 2024
6.30am Newt study continued: Inspect all the newt traps and release newts and any other freshwater invertebrates back into the ponds. Discuss our newt survey results.
9.30am: Breakfast – included are breakfast sandwiches provided by the wonderful Millstack Cafe in Oakworth
10.15am: Local Walk to complete the Newt study
12noon: Depart
