Kilnsey Park Estate Bioblitz

Kilnsey Crag

On Friday 30th May, the full NEYEDC team travelled to Kilnsey Park Estate, in the North York Moors, for a 24-hour bioblitz of the park and the surrounding estate. Organised by the estate manager, NEYEDC, and Upper Wharfedale Field Society, the event was an open invitation to all – from families to experienced recorders – to explore the site between Friday 30th 16:00 – Saturday 31st May 16:00 and record wildlife to create a snapshot of its biodiversity.

The estate originally contacted NEYEDC seeking support with the event, which they were keen to run as a means of better understanding the biodiversity that the estate supports, which in turn would help them manage the site better for nature. The site is already highly sustainable, with water turbines, solar panels, heat pumps, and a sustainable trout farm. The wider estate encompasses a huge variety of habitats, from moorland, lakes, streams, woodland, flushes, grassland, a quarry, and limestone pavement; a very interesting landscape for a bioblitz! The main site is also home to an SSSI (Site of Special Scientific Interest) at Kilnsey Flushes, which supports multiple species of orchid and other notable limestone flora.

NEYEDC Data Hub at Coniston & Kilnsey Village Hall, during the moth trap opening.

Working with the estate manager, we devised recording zones across the main site and surrounding areas. A smaller central area, including the flushes SSSI, woodland, and grassland, was open to the public to record within, with a wider zone encompassing Kilnsey Quarry, Kilnsey Moor, Coniston Old Pasture (also an SSSI), along the River Wharfe, and Ings Pasture, which was open to experienced recorders and naturalists.

On the day of the event, we set up a Data Hub inside Coniston & Kilnsey Village Hall, where naturalists and members of the public could pick up maps, recording forms, and other resources, as well as giving us an area to collate and share records throughout the event.

Naturalist support at the event was fantastic, with experts from all local groups in the Dales area attending. Many of these naturalists offered to lead walks and activities throughout the bioblitz, which began on Friday evening with a wildlife walk led by Judith Allinson (Craven Conservation Group), with assistance from Derek Whiteley (Yoredale Natural History Society), with members of the NEYEDC team on hand to record the species found. To finish off the evening, Tony Serjeant (Upper Wharfedale Field Society) and Robyn Geldard took the group on a bat walk, where we recorded five species of bat using detectors on woodland edges and within the main woodland, before finishing at one of Kilnsey’s lakes, where we were treated to large numbers of bats feeding just above us.

Before the night was over, we set moth traps at various points around the site, as did other moth recorders who attended the event, ready to open the following morning. We also placed a number of photo and video camera traps in the hopes of capturing some nocturnal action!

First thing the next morning we headed out to retrieve the moth and camera traps, which we opened at the Village Hall. We had some really interesting species in the traps, including Thyme Pug, a rare and very local resident in Yorkshire with only eight recent records in VC64. Our latest record represents a new record for the 10km square! This species inhabits mainly limestone and chalky districts, with our specimen found inside Kilnsey’s limestone quarry. Other species included Coxcomb Prominent (Ptilodon capucina), Pale-shouldered Brocade (Lacanobia thalassina), and Cloud-bordered Brindle (Lacanobia thalassina). Moth recorders Nyree and Dave Fearnley (Wharfedale Naturalists, Butterfly Conservation), hosted a public moth-trap opening the same morning, which was well-attended and gave the public the opportunity to see a range of interesting species up-close, including the ever-popular Poplar Hawk-moth (Laothoe populi) and the impressive Lesser Swallow Prominent (Pheosia gnoma).

Back inside the village hall, we had a brilliant surprise when checking the camera trap footage. Whilst the cameras didn’t produce huge numbers of sightings (a Grey Squirrel and some Mallard), we caught a very special few seconds of footage on a camera set on a beck close to the village hall – two Otters! We were absolutely delighted to capture this pair, who seemed to immediately notice the camera trap before making a quick getaway back into the water.

A new programme of guided walks and activities started later in the morning and ran until the afternoon, including an insect-oriented wildlife walk with Derek Whiteley, river sampling with Tony Serjeant, a moss walk with Steven Heathcote, lichens with Judith Allinson, a bug safari with Roger and Rosy Key, and a wildflower walk led by NEYEDC’s Claire Bending. The general public got involved kick sampling, sweep netting, and using keys to ID finds in the field with the support of the naturalists on hand. Recorders Penny Relf, Dave Conniss, and Christine Bell were also on hand to offer support to the activity leaders and help the public in using iNaturalist. We also had assistance from Bradford Botany Group, whose recorders (Kay McDowell and Bruce Brown) gave their time to hours of systematic recording of plants at the site.

Lady’s Slipper Orchid - Lucy Baldwin

One of the highlights at the site was a very special orchid, the Lady’s Slipper, of which Kilnsey is one of only two locations in the UK where you can see this spectacular and incredibly rare species. This is a native plant and was originally thought to be extinct in the UK, mainly as a result of collecting, until a single plant was discovered by chance in 1930 in the Yorkshire Dales. It was re-introduced at Kilnsey in 2007, and since that time there have been a small number of reintroductions at suitable sites across Northern England (most of which are undisclosed, for the plant’s protection). Last year, it was found that one of these reintroduced plants had successfully seeded and germinated to produce a ‘wild’ Lady’s Slipper.

Later in the day, the NEYEDC team came together for a final push to input records from the Saturday’s guided walks and those from experienced recorders who had put in hours of recording effort across the estate since the Friday afternoon. Records were added to the bioblitz iNaturalist project, which was used as a means of recording in situ and as a repository for records collected on recording forms. This is still being added to as specimens retained and photographed at the event are being identified by taxonomic experts, and input by NEYEDC, but at the time of writing, 471 species have been recorded.

The event was a great success, and we were delighted to share Kilnsey’s first bioblitz with many dedicated and knowledgeable recorders and their associated societies and groups, to whom we are very grateful for their time and efforts before, during, and after the event. It was also a fantastic opportunity to explore Kilnsey’s incredible range of habitats and species, access to which was kindly given to recorders by the estate for the purpose of recording.

In the coming weeks, the final counts for total number of species and species in each taxonomic group will be confirmed, which we’ll be sharing on our social media channels. After the success of this year’s event, the estate are keen to hold annual bioblitzes at a range of times throughout the year for a complete picture of Kilnsey’s flora and fauna.

Thanks to all recorders, supporters, and general public attendees of the event, including Upper Wharfedale Field Society, Wharfedale Naturalists, Yoredale Natural History Society, Craven Conservation Group, and Bradford Botany Group.