Scything Season

Scything Season: why managing meadows in autumn is vital for local wildlife

As summer comes to an end, at the Aire Rivers Trust we are turning our attention to the important autumn and winter tasks that help care for our local rivers. One key practical task for our volunteers throughout September is managing meadows along our rivers, helping to maintain these valuable habitats after the growing season.

What are meadows?

Meadows are grassland habitats made up of a mix of grasses, wildflowers and other plants. Traditionally, the grasses and wildflowers are left to grow through spring and summer before being cut in late summer or early autumn, often for hay (Plantlife n.d.). There are many different types of meadow in the UK, from floodplain meadows to upland hay meadows. The type of meadow depends on factors such as soil type, moisture levels and altitude, and each supports its own mix of plant species.

Across Bradford and Keighley, our meadows can support species such as wild orchids, meadowsweet, ragged robin and yellow rattle. Further up the Aire Valley, in the Yorkshire Dales, you’ll find some of the last remaining traditional wildflower meadows in England, with some areas containing up to 120 species of wildflowers and grasses (YDMT n.d.).

Despite efforts by various conservation organisations to conserve our remaining areas of wildflower meadow, the UK has lost 97% of them in the last 90 years, driven by changes in farming practices, chemical fertilisers and land development.

Benefits of meadows

Our remaining meadows have an important role to play in supporting a remarkable range of wildlife. Wildflowers provide nectar and pollen for bees, butterflies, hoverflies and other pollinating insects, while grasses and taller plants offer food and shelter for animals such as voles, frogs and ground-nesting birds.
Meadows also play an important role in mitigating and adapting to climate change. They can store carbon, cycle nutrients, slow the flow of rainwater across the land and help reduce flood risk.

Scenic view of a grassy field with trees in the background.

Managing a mosaic of meadow habitats across the Aire Valley helps create habitat corridors and stepping stones for wildlife. Connected habitats allow plants, insects, birds and mammals to move through the landscape more easily, linking rivers, woodlands, wetlands and other natural spaces.

Finally, meadows are also important spaces for people. They provide an accessible and beautiful green space where people can enjoy and connect with nature, and learn about the plants and wildlife found locally.

Purple wildflowers growing in natural riverbank habitat.
Wildflower meadow with fly on clover on yellow flowers.

Wildflower meadows can be incredibly diverse: common spotted-orchid, clover and birds foot trefoil.

Where we manage meadows

At the Aire Rivers Trust, we focus our meadow management work on a small number of sites in the Aire Valley.

Firstly, we manage a floodable meadow in Baildon. This area helps to reduce the risk of flooding to homes in Bradford and Leeds. Shallow dips dug on the site can fill with water in winter, slowing the flow of water into our main river. This damp ground will allow wildflowers to flourish. To create this site, volunteers worked hard cutting hay and clearing larger plants like scrub and trees, and sowing wildflower seed. We continue to cut and rake the area each year in early autumn. We also manage a meadow within the woodland of the Damems Nature Reserve in Keighley, cutting the grass and raking it off each year at the end of summer

Why and how we manage meadows

Wildflower meadows need careful ongoing management to remain species rich, and prevent them from becoming dominated by a small number of vigorous grasses. If left entirely unmanaged, scrub and tree species may also begin to establish, changing the type of habitat present. Meanwhile, too much management can be just as damaging. If meadows are cut too frequently or at the wrong time of year, wildflowers may not have the chance to flower and set seed.

Wildflower meadow with trees and blue sky in the background.

There is no single approach to managing a meadow. Different sites require different techniques, and management needs to reflect the conditions and wildlife found there. One of the most important techniques is cutting and removing the grass and vegetation at the appropriate time of year. At the Aire Rivers Trust, working with our volunteers, we usually carry out one cut in September, after the flowers have had a chance to seed. We cut the meadows using traditional scythes, maintaining a historical technique that is thousands of years old. We then remove the material and gather it into piles with hay rakes.

Baildon Floodable Meadow

Removing the cut material gradually lowers soil fertility, which can encourage a greater variety of wildflowers. Many wildflowers do best in less fertile soils, where grasses are less likely to dominate. The cut grass is left in piles at the edge of the meadow, creating safe refuges for insects and amphibians that may be sheltering there. On larger sites, we may also use an auto-scythe to help complete the work more efficiently. We may also need to manage scrub or unwanted vegetation within and around the meadow, particularly where young trees and shrubs are beginning to encroach on open grassland. We have carried out similar work at Trench Meadows in Shipley, where we helped prevent trees and scrub from spreading onto the meadow and reducing the area of open grassland.
We are always looking for new volunteers to help us with conservation tasks throughout the year. If you would like to get involved visit: www.aireriverstrust.org.uk/volunteer/

Volunteers cleaning a meadow alongside a riverbank for environmental conservation.
Volunteers cleaning a meadow alongside a riverbank for environmental conservation.
Volunteers cleaning a meadow alongside a riverbank for environmental conservation.

Volunteers cutting and raking the meadow in Baildon

References:

Yorkshire Dales Millennium Trust (2026). Wildflower meadows. Available at: https://www.ydmt.org/what-we-do/landscape-and-wildlife/wildflower-meadows (Accessed: 25 August 2026)

Plantlife (2026). How to manage a meadow. Available at: plantlife.org.uk (Accessed 25 August 2026)

Himalayan Balsam pulling season

Each summer, Himalayan balsam (Impatiens glandulifera) appears again along riverbanks throughout the Aire catchment, and for our volunteers, that means balsam-pulling season is back.

At first glance, this tall plant with its bright pink flowers may seem attractive, but it is actually a problematic ‘invasive non-native species’, that negatively affects our rivers and watercourses. An invasive non-native species is a plant or animal that has been introduced to a country or area, spreads rapidly and causes harm to its new environment.

A stand of Himalayan Balsam in flower

Volunteers at the Aire Rivers Trust therefore spend the early summer months taking part in one of our most important and satisfying conservation activities – balsam pulling, also known as ‘balsam bashing’.

Why is Himalayan Balsam a problem?

Originally introduced to the UK as an ornamental garden plant, Himalayan balsam spreads rapidly along river corridors, canals and transport networks like railways and roads. It grows quickly from spring onwards, forms dense stands, and crowds out native vegetation, reducing biodiversity and leaving little space for wildflowers and other important riverbank plants.

In winter, unlike many native species, Himalayan balsam dies back completely, leaving bare soil exposed along riverbanks. Without deep-rooted vegetation to hold the soil together, banks become vulnerable to erosion during periods of high water and flooding.

Each plant can produce hundreds of seeds, which burst out of the seed pods in mid-late summer and spread far and wide, being carried downstream by rivers. This means that the plants (and the problem!) spread each year.

The power of volunteers

Despite being problematic for wildlife, Himalayan balsam is one of the easier invasive species to tackle. Its shallow root system means it can be easily removed by hand, simply pulling the plant from the bottom of the stem, before it sets seed. Every summer, volunteers from the Aire Rivers Trust head out to riverbanks, smaller becks and woodlands across the catchment to remove balsam and give native plants a chance to thrive again. These sessions are not only beneficial for local wildlife but are also a great opportunity to spend time outdoors, meet like-minded people and make a visible difference to the local environment.

A volunteer removing balsam from the riverbank
A small group of volunteers working to remove balsam from the riverbank
Solo volunteer balsam bashing

A catchment-wide approach

Managing invasive species requires working together and repeating the task each year. Seeds can travel long distances along rivers, so successful control relies on communities, landowners and volunteers working together across the entire catchment, over consecutive years. Many Rivers Trusts across the UK have shown that sustained annual balsam-pulling efforts can dramatically reduce the plant’s presence and allow native habitats to recover.

A group of volunteers celebrating their balsam bashing efforts
Himalayan balsam pulling is an easy activity suitable for all ages

Get involved

So far this year, we have pulled balsam at Fagley Beck in Ravenscliffe, Hawkstone, Chellow Dene and Pitty Beck, with more areas coming up in July. Some of these volunteer days been a part of our Roots in the River Project, funded by the National Lottery Heritage Fund. Thank you to the National Lottery, and a huge thank you to all of our volunteers for making this possible!

Whether you volunteer regularly or are looking to join us for the first time, balsam pulling is a great way to help nature in your area. No specific experience is required, and our team will help you with identifying and safely removing the plant. Sign up to volunteer here: Volunteer with Us – Aire Rivers Trust

Roots in the River: Celebrating Spring and connecting with nature!

Welcome to our blog series as part of our Roots in the River project, where we will be sharing different stories and experiences as the seasons pass by. First up – celebrating Spring and connecting with nature!

Having passed the spring equinox on Friday 20th March, spring is officially here! Over the past few weeks, we have seen shoots appearing, the first flowers of the year blooming, and that cold edge in the air has gone. Spring offers a great opportunity to get out into nature, connecting with the natural world to reap the well-being benefits it can offer. As the cold and shorter days of winter have passed, engaging communities with nature becomes easier, as many people are ready to be outside again, and the natural world becomes a more inviting place to be. Rivers are a great place to bring people together. For those of us involved in conservation work, surveying, or simply walking the same stretches of river regularly, spring is when everything starts moving again.

The wonderful North Beck in spring, near the Tinker Bridge in Keighley. © Anna Williams

Connecting with nature has been shown to provide us with many benefits, such as improved mental wellbeing, greater meaning and purpose in life, and more pro-environmental behaviours (University of Derby). Nature connection can be very simple, it is about the feelings you get whilst in nature. Spring is one of the easiest times of year to feel a real connection to nature, especially when walking by a river. The senses seem to wake up along with the landscape. The more time you spend in nature, especially in spring with longer days and warmer weather, the more you realise that nature connection comes from noticing small things, using your different senses to recognise them, and think about how this makes you feel. Standing by a river at this time of year, you are reminded that nature connection is not complicated, it involves simply being present long enough to see, hear, smell, and feel the natural world around you.

People wildlife spotting through binoculars on a river bank
Aire Rivers Trust staff connecting with nature and spotting wildlife at the RSPB St Aidens reserve on the River Aire. © Ruth McBain

Spring can also provide an excellent time to feel inspired! Through our Roots in the River project, we have recently run some river workshops with the Art4All groups at Keighley Healthy Living, where we explored different river themes and took inspiration from various photos and a visit to the River Worth. The groups are currently producing some wonderful river related artwork that will be displayed at an exhibition at the KHL centre on Saturday 25th April.

Blackthorn in flower with lake in the background

Next time you walk near your local river, or are passing by some nature, take time to notice and pay attention to any wildlife around you. You might notice new buds and shoots on ash, beech or oak trees, leaves emerging from alder, field maple and silver birch, or blossoms blooming on blackthorn and crab apple. Look out for pollinators too as they begin to move around to feed on newly grown flowers. Peacock, comma and red admiral butterflies can be spotted this time of year, and you could also spot beetles, spiders and ladybirds. You may also spot some special migrant bird visitors that return to the UK after spending the winter in warmer areas, including blackcap, chiffchaff and wheatear.

A beautiful blackthorn tree (Prunus spinosa) in full blossom. © Ruth McBain

At the Aire Rivers Trust, practical volunteer days, guided walks and surveying activities can help people notice things they might otherwise pass by. Why not join us on one of our very rewarding volunteer days, which run on Thursdays and Fridays, or help us with our citizen science monitoring programme. Find out how you could get involved to help nature here: https://aireriverstrust.org.uk/volunteer/

Other ways you can connect with nature this spring:

Find out more about the nature connection research here: https://www.derby.ac.uk/research/themes/zero-carbon/zero-carbon-nbs-research-centre/nature-connectedness-research-group/

Qualifying to row the Atlantic

Jake Still is training for a huge challenge – rowing solo across the Atlantic in just under 500 days’ time, fundraising for The Rivers Trust and Aire Rivers Trust with every stroke. This is the second of his guest blog posts, documenting the long journey to even reach the start of the race. Read his first update if you missed it, here.

Words: Jake Still

What does it take to qualify for the World’s Toughest Row?

Words by Jake Still

To get the start line of the race, you must complete the required training hours on the water. As a minimum, rowers must complete 120 hours, 24 hours must be during the night and at least one session must be over 36 hours. As a solo rower, this will mean I will have to learn to successfully anchor offshore because it would be impossible to do this without having to sleep. Ultimately, these hours are about getting used to living on board rather than rowing. Afterall, I will be spending at least 40 days at sea and everyday things like sleeping, cooking, hygiene and even going to the toilet are no-longer trivial tasks when you’re on a boat that will rock about.

Before I took Azula (the name of my boat) out to sea, I began my early training on Lake Windermere. This was so I could familiarise myself with basic navigation, steering and handling without having to deal with tides and other hazards on the coast. Sessions were short (around 4 hours) and I would mark some waypoints and make sure I practiced heading on the right course of ground either manually steering with the oars, or by learning to use the autopilot. For coastal training, it is very important to be proficient in navigation. Compared to sculling on a river, it is a lot different on an ocean rowing boat because every movement feels sluggish.

The hardest part of training session is the logistics of getting Azula into the water! Specifically, the rudder which must retrofitted after launching and usually means having to get into the water to attach. Luckily, I had an old diving dry suit to avoid getting wet!

A man in a white teeshirt looks at the camera as he rows a large white boat solo on a lake

While I was training on the Lakes, I was also taking Azula around West Yorkshire to public events to showcase her and tell people about the challenge I am undertaking. I took her to Baildon Carnival, Farsley Festival and to Adore’s Weavers Court Care home in Yeadon. It was exciting to be engaging with my local communities and answering all their questions and explaining everything on board Azula. I also brought an erg (an indoor rowing machine) and challenged the public to row as far they could in one minute. It was great to see people all ages have a go, from as young as 4 up to 70 and there was plenty of competitive spirit among the communities, especially among fellow cadets and friends. One girl came back multiple times to try and best her score.

A row of pensioners pose in front of the boat with Jake

1 / 3

At the end of July, Azula found her new home in Hartlepool Marina, where she will mostly stay over the course of the next 18 months. For my first open sea session, I did a 3-day training camp with Duncan Roy (Ocean rowing trainer/coach) and not only did he teach me the skills to safely train out at sea but to thrive on it. Water sessions included being able to get in and out of the Marina, being able to deploy the anchor (for emergencies or resting), passage planning routes and navigating them and using the VHF radio to cross the Teesside Shipping Channel (home to vessels of 200m+ length). It was amazing to be out in the open sea and feel as though crossing an ocean is becoming more of a reality. On day 2, I got to see the Teesside offshore windfarm up close and was lucky enough to see some seals popping their heads out like meerkats. To finish the day off, I had the opportunity to anchor offshore and sleep out on the water. Felt a bit like camping back in Scouts, minus the bobbing about on the water. Also had to use the bucket for the first time. Thankfully the water was flat and there were no spill issues. The only awkward bit was manoeuvring your bottoms through your harness gear and equipment.

A man stands on a white boat with oars in a calm ocean with blue skies and a windfarm visible behind

The next steps for me are to continue getting more experience out on the water and build up my skills and confidence over the Summer and early Autumn and at least qualify for the race.

You can follow Jake on social media (@jakedarcystill) or support his goals on the donation plaform Givestar.

First, La Gomera

At the end of 2025, data scientist and rower Jake Still plans to embark on an almighty rowing challenge while fundraising to support the restoration of his beloved rivers back home. Spending up to 50 or so days at sea alone, he’s aiming row across the Atlantic solo. This is the first in his series of guest blog posts, in which he’ll keep us updated with his training and eventual race progress.

The World’s Toughest Row Atlantic 2024 race is nearing the end with the last few boats still to come in and officially marks 10 months to go until I launch from San Sebastion in La Gomera. Earlier in December, I had the opportunity to travel down to La Gomera to see the race start line. It was exciting to be down there and see the marina with all the boats lined up in the water and how amazing to see the support from the locals with the race banners spread across the various local businesses such as restaurants.

If you can, it is advised to travel to La Gomera before your race year because it has been very helpful to familiarise myself with the process getting to the island and the knowing where everything on the island is. It is a little thing to help take pressure during my race year. To travel to La Gomera you have to fly Tenerife and then take the ferry across. The ferry was an interesting ride and my first taste of being rocked by deep water waves in the Atlantic as it travelled between the islands, a teaser to what will happen daily on my little rowing boat.

A person overlooking a city skyline and river at night from a boat with blue lighting.

Visiting the start line La Gomera is one of the rare moments when you get to experience the largest fleet of ocean rowing boats. It was very beneficial seeing many different crew boats because each crew had their own unique setup and seeing the different approaches helps to generate ideas for what additions/work I need to do on my boat to prep her for the Atlantic. It was lovely to catch up with some of the crews I had met throughout 2024 either through doing sea survival courses together or training up in the North Sea at Hartlepool. Got the chance to hop on their boat and ask them lots of questions and deep dive into their kit. One of things I wanted to check was how spares were being secured. It was great to see them set off in La Gomera and having met some of the crews made the 2024 race more special to watch them as they traverse across the Atlantic and seeing them finally arrive in Antigua was amazing.

Inclusive community boating event in Leeds dock.

It was not only just current rowers there. There were lots of past rowers and future rowers, some who had raced in the previous year and others who enjoy coming back every year. It was fantastic speaking to them too about their own stories and how they found their crossing. La Gomera is very special for ocean rowing because of the World’s Toughest Row and it is great to be a part of this awesome community.

We wish Jake well with his training and eventually on his epic challenge. You can follow his progress via occasional blogs on this site.

Ellie’s Weir…ed Blog

In this post our GIS whizz Ellie Spilsbury outlines some of the work we have been doing to identify ways to improve the sustainability of the fisheries in our rivers and hopefully aid the return of salmon for the first time since the Industrial Revolution.

Look closely and you will see hundreds of Minnows collecting at the bottom of this weir, unable to ascend. See the area in the water that looks dark brown; they are Minnows.



Visit each of the three sections for more detail:

A familiar Story

Data analysis with a Salmon Splash of professional opinion

(Tr)outcomes expected










A familar story

Once upon a time, our River Aire had the highest Salmon population of any Yorkshire river. Then came the Industrial Revolution, which saw the wool and fabric industry boom throughout Yorkshire. Mills were constructed accompanied by weirs to harness our river’s energy. Although the mills are now closed and are becoming swanky new flats, the weirs often remain, isolating ecosystems that lie between them. Weirs disrupt the natural transport of sediment downstream, causing a build-up of silt and gravel behind the weir, which is detrimental to the habitat of spawning fish. Since 2011, one of the Aire River Trust’s goals has been to increase the connectivity of our river and its tributaries by removing or re-configuring weirs to allow fish passage. Following earlier work to install fish passes through and downstream of Leeds, significant steps towards this goal were made in 2022 with the successful construction of four fish passes as part of the DNAire project.

When we see water flowing over weirs, creating the sounds of waterfalls and visually pleasing white waters, it is easy to forget their man-made heritage and artificiality. It is hard to imagine seeing through the eyes of a migrating trout or salmon; every cell in its body instinctively directing it upstream to spawn, using both the stars and the earth’s magnetic field for navigation and then facing an unpassable wall of Yorkshire-dressed stone. It is often not just the height of the weir that presents the issue but the combination of weir height and the shallow depth of the concrete sill below the weir. The height at which salmon and trout jump is directly affected by the relative depth of the water at the foot of the barrier and the “hydraulic jump,” which boosts their leap.

The Environment Agency (EA) has identified around four hundred river obstacles within the Aire Catchment. However, we believe there to be many more. For example, the EA recorded two barriers to fish passage on Pitty Beck, yet on our Bradford Becks Walkovers, we found 11. This pattern is most likely repeated on each beck.  Currently, tackling the removal of every weir in the catchment is unattainable. So, how did we prioritise them into a workable top twenty?

Data analysis with a Salmon splash of professional opinion

With help from The Rivers Trust, we are the first regional rivers trust to code an ArcGIS tool to accurately calculate the length of a river (including tributaries and forks) that would be opened and re-connected by the removal of every mapped weir in the Aire Catchment. Alongside this, we analysed ecological assessment data, invertebrate biodiversity, local community data (including deprivation), and weir visibility to the public. We assigned a score to each outcome and designed a weighted decision-making matrix that identified the weirs that scored the most highly. The data only tells us half the story, so we took our results to our expert team and discussed those weirs for which a solution in the short(ish) term might be feasible.

Once we had twenty feasible weirs, it was time to ground truth our ideas. The purpose of site visits is to add or, more often, diminish our confidence in the feasibility of the weir so that we only carry the most achievable sites to the next stage. We evaluated the weirs’ condition, site access, utility services or abstraction points, and landowner engagement by photographing and recording the area, our thoughts, and encounters.

The most surprising discovery for me was the actual size of a weir. After months of viewing photographs without visual perspective, weirs can appear to be half the scale of the real-life structure. Take a moment to analyse this photo: how tall do you believe it to be? See the very bottom of the blog for the upside-down answer.






(Tr)outcomes

We are fast approaching the end of the site visits and write-up stage. It is time to narrow our shortlist of twenty weirs down to four. So, it will be back around the table for our professionals to decide on the four “leak” proof projects to invest in. These four weirs will be subject to a comprehensive feasibility study and design process. I hope my next blog post will include more designs, machinery, hard hats and re-naturalised rivers.







OurCleanRiver 2024

Last year 13 groups joined the Aire Rivers Trust’s OurCleanRiver event. The highlights were clearing tons of debris at Bull Greave Beck and using the steam train in Keighley to transport rubbish and volunteers.

In 2024 we want to involve even more groups in community action to improve our river from Gargrave to Leeds and beyond. These clean-ups will remove litter and debris pollution to help boost the entire river’s health.
River clean-up events will start on Thursday, 14th March until Friday, 22nd March 2024.
This also ties in with the dates of Keep Britain Tidy Spring Clean.

This is the 3rd year we are running events bringing together community action and improvements in your local river.
The improvements are beneficial for wildlife as well as the visual appearance of the district.

How Can Your Community Group Join OurCleanRiver 2024?

Similar to last year we would love you to pick a section of river or beck local to you and organise a clean-up between the dates.

We are able to support your group with equipment, risk assessments, social media templates, and arranging the removal of the collected rubbish.

This is just one of a selection of photos and suggested wording for social media posts we have to share. We can use your logo and wording to complete the phrase.

After you have completed the cleanup, we will ask you to record your achievements and send a photo of the group with the rubbish you have collected.

Join us for River Clean Ups 2024

Aire Rivers Trust will be leading several River Clean Ups across the middle catchment. Dates and locations are available below. Please sign up as a volunteer via our My Impact system at the bottom of the page.

Date and TimePlaceOrganised byLead by
Thursday 14 March 10:00-15:00Kirkstall Goit, KirkstallAire Rivers Trust contact@aireriverstrust.org.uk
01274 061902		Gareth Muir gareth.muir@aireriverstrust.org.uk
07883 892634
Friday 15 March 10:00-15:00Buck Lane, BaildonAire Rivers Trust contact@aireriverstrust.org.uk
01274 061902		Gareth Muir gareth.muir@aireriverstrust.org.uk
07883 892634
Thurs-Fri 21-22 March 10:00-15:00Holme Beck Holmewood BD4Aire Rivers Trust contact@aireriverstrust.org.uk
01274 061902		Gareth Muir gareth.muir@aireriverstrust.org.uk
07883 892634
Thursday 28th March 10:00-15:00Fagley Beck Foston Lane BD2Aire Rivers Trust contact@aireriverstrust.org.uk
01274 061902		Gareth Muir gareth.muir@aireriverstrust.org.uk
07883 892634
Thurs-Fri 4-5 April 10:00-15:00Fagley Beck Ravenscliffe BD10Aire Rivers Trust contact@aireriverstrust.org.uk
01274 061902		Gareth Muir gareth.muir@aireriverstrust.org.uk
07883 892634
Thurs-Fri 11-12 April 10:00-15:00Bradford Beck (Poplar Rd-station) Shipley BD18Aire Rivers Trust contact@aireriverstrust.org.uk
01274 061902		Nick Milsom
nick.milsom@aireriverstrust.org.uk 07378 878857
Thursday
18 April
10:00-15:00		Keighley Worth Valley Railway, KeighleyAire Rivers Trust contact@aireriverstrust.org.uk
01274 061902		Gareth Muir gareth.muir@aireriverstrust.org.uk
07883 892634
Friday 19 April 10:00-15:00Aireworth Grove, KeighleyAire Rivers Trust contact@aireriverstrust.org.uk
01274 061902		Gareth Muir gareth.muir@aireriverstrust.org.uk
07883 892634
Thurs-Fri 25-26 April 10:00-15:00Eller Beck, SkiptonAire Rivers Trust contact@aireriverstrust.org.uk
01274 061902		Gareth Muir gareth.muir@aireriverstrust.org.uk
07883 892634

How To Get Involved

Click here for volunteering opportunities at the Aire Rivers Trust

Practical Conservation update January 2024

Project Officer Gareth Muir gives us an update about what the volunteers have been up to last month. 

Tool maintenance

After returning from the Christmas and New Year break, the practical volunteers got stuck into a spot of tool maintenance. Volunteers joined staff at our office in Greengates to sort, clean, sharpen and oil the tools used by the volunteers to carry out practical environmental conservation tasks. Without these tools, we could not carry out the work, so they must be in top condition! Staff and volunteers had the (un)enviable task of going through the Trust’s protective equipment (PPE), ensuring it was safe, working and effective. Thankfully, everything was ship shape and Bristol fashion!

Coppicing at Druid’s Altar, St Ives, Bingley

Volunteers undertook some coppicing at Druid’s Altar hazel coppice on St Ives Estate, Bingley. Coppicing is a traditional form of woodland management with roots going back hundreds if not thousands of years. Using hand tools including; loppers, bowsaws and the iconic billhook, volunteers cut hazel ‘stools’ to harvest ‘rods’ of various diameters for a range of uses. The main use was to produce hazel hedging stakes. These stakes were later used on sites within the catchment to lay hedges. In the process of producing these stakes, volunteers realised the perfect length for a stake was an ‘Olivia’ (our River Conservation Assistant) of 1.5 metres! Over the course of three work days, volunteers coppiced 21 stools and produced 112 stakes, some may say the stakes were…’high’.
Why not visit the National Coppicing association to find out more about this fascinating traditional craft?

National Coppice Federation – National Coppice Federation (ncfed.org.uk)

Two leaves sit in a graphic that divides text

Hedge maintenance at Trench Meadow, Baildon

The volunteers were busy trimming the holly hedgerow at Trench Meadow. A hedgerow, which in the past had been neglected was in need of some tender loving care. The volunteers provided this by cutting back the encroaching greenery onto the footpath, allowing footpath users to path through unmolested by errant pickily leaves! The volunteers also took the opportunity to remove encroaching bramble on the meadow, thus preventing it’s natural succession into woodland. Trench Meadow is a Site of Special Scientific interest (SSSI) containing a variety of flora, which the Trust aims to safeguard for the future.
To find out about Trench Meadow, why not visit this interesting blog post by ‘The Nature Guy’ who contacted the Trust in summer 2023:

Meet your local SSSI (natureguy.blog)

Hedge laying at Ryeloaf Meadows, Bingley

Hedge-laying continues to be a firm favourite with the Trust’s practical conservation volunteers. This month volunteers worked had to lay a predominantly hazel hedge at Ryeloaf Meadows, Bingley; a fantastically untouched site beneath the Bingley Relief Road. Accessed via Dowley Gap Waste centre, the site is managed by Bradford Council’s Countryside and Rights of Way team with the Aire Rivers Trust carrying out environmental conservation tasks onsite on their behalf. The traditional countryside management craft of hedge laying is enjoying some what of a resurgence of late and as an organisation the Trust is keen to keep these traditional skills alive and use them to improve habitat in the catchment and beyond. If you’d like to find out more about hedge laying, why not visit the National Hedge laying Society website:

Home Page (hedgelaying.org.uk)

Willow Clearance at Ryeloaf Meadows, Bingley

Willow clearance on the riverside at Ryeloaf Meadows continues, with volunteers removing dense patches of willow near the water’s edge. Large stands of willow deflect the flow of the river away from the site, which acts as a flood water overflow. The cut willow is stacked into dense brash piles, which will in time become a new habitat for invertebrates and potentially laying up spots for male otters in the summertime. The composition of the woodland at Ryeloaf Meadow is ‘wet’ woodland (predominantly common alder and crack willow), which is an under represented habitat in the Bradford area. Woodland management often includes thinning tree numbers and producing deadwood, so that multiple layers of habitat are present with a ‘mosaic’ of canopy, understory, shrub and herb layer.

Two leaves sit in a graphic that divides text

January was a busy month with a variety of tasks. The ‘nature’ (pardon the pun) of practical conservation dictates that the tasks performed by volunteers vary greatly. Moving ahead into the end of winter the volunteers will be continuing hedge laying, tree planting and gearing up to the river clean ups, once the flood waters have subsided.

Two leaves sit in a graphic that divides text

How To Get Involved

Click here for volunteering opportunities at the Aire Rivers Trust

Weir today. Gone tomorrow?

A group of postgraduate students from the University of Leeds have been visiting the riverside in Keighley as part of their “Engaging the Modern City” module. They’ve been keen to find out more about the river and what residents want to know about it. In response, they’ve produced the leaflet below.

On the front we will use several modules to present the issues we have investigated and a module at the back to recommend areas of PR activity around Keighley and to summarise our fieldwork

Jingzhe Zeng

A central theme they have been particularly interested in is the old weirs. What was their purpose? What do people hope might happen to them? Should they remain?

There used to be dozens of mills that thrived on the River aire, but now these mills have mostly been transformed into heritage for other activities.

The concern, however, is that the weirs that provided power to these mills still remain as part of the river channel, and from an ecological standpoint, they block the passage of fish that want to swim upstream for food, breeding, or refuge.

The ideal solution would be to remove these structures to make the river more level, or to build fish passes. For more details, check out https://aireriverstrust.org.uk/fish-passes/.

Please feel free to share your thoughts in the comments. Do you support the removal of weirs? Why or why not?

Jingzhe Zeng
Two fish leap in a graphic that divides text

Reconnecting the river for wildlife

The Aire Rivers Trust has just completed it’s Developing the Natural Aire project. Together with the Environment Agency, we have built fish passes to link 40km of the river to encourage the return of Atlantic salmon.

“It is fantastic to know that these fish passes in the upper River Aire are working as designed, and important fish species are rediscovering their key habitat

“As well as reopening rivers to fish migration and protecting ecologically important and endangered species like salmon and eel, fish passes are an amazing opportunity to reconnect river-resident species and the local community.

“Over the coming years, we look forward to seeing a growing proportion of trout, chub, barbel and salmon run spawning journeys higher up the river and a recovery in their populations.”

Thomas Somerville, Environment Agency’s Developing the Natural Aire Project Manager 

You can read more about fish passes here.

Top