Wild West Yorkshire nature diary
silver birch peacock butterfly

Seckar Heath

Monday 10th April 2000
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silver birch IT SEEMS STRANGE to cut down trees to improve wildlife habitat, but Seckar Heath, south of Wakefield, is special. Here there is the biggest stretch of Heather moorland that you are likely to find within five miles of the city. Silver Birch and Sessile Oak saplings would soon turn the heath into woodland, if they were left unchecked.

peacock butterfly Peacock and Comma butterflies are active. In the woodland surrounding the heath the first Bluebells are coming into flower.

bluebell An interesting features of the heath can also be a hazard to walkers. There are new warning signs about the narrow crevices you can encounter if you wander off the main track amongst the Gorse. These are cracks in the bed of sandstone that lies beneath the heath. They have a trend south-south-west to north-north-east, which suggests they are connected with the faults that run across the Yorkshire coalfield. Some of them have been adapted as burrows by Rabbits and Foxes.

Richard Bell
Richard Bell,
wildlife illustrator
E-mail; 'richard@daelnet.co.uk'

  
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