Treemendous news for countryside campaigners: council says 'nationally significant' tree must not be felled

Bradford council has turned down house-builder Persimmon's request to fully remove to ground level the 'nationally significant' veteran ash tree pictured above. The ash is a stand-out feature of the wonderfully hedgerowed fields at Hawber Cote where Persimmon controversially is to build 138 upmarket homes. Walkers accompanied by a giant model of a curlew are pictured heading towards the ash tree during a community ramble held by Silsden's Campaign for the Countryside last May to celebrate the beauty of the Hawber fields and to lament all that will be lost to housing.

Persimmon applied to completely fell the tree last September. Soon after, as I showed in my blog of November 6th, the tree lost a major arm, apparently in high winds. The ash is thought to be around 150 years old and is protected by a preservation order. Refusing premission to fell it, Bradford council says the ash is highly significant in the landscape. It is not showing signs of ash dieback and could be a resistant specimen, adding to the importance of its retention.

The intact ash, pictured here in January 2024, is a veteran tree listed in the Woodland Trusts Ancient Tree Inventory and as such is considered to be nationally significant and irreplaceable habitat. Persimmon says it is concerned about the safety of the tree and insists the ash will inevitably succumb to the dieback disease.

The tree is shown here in all its summer splendour in 2021. The council says that on balance Persimmon's case for removing a veteran tree is not compelling and the evidence provided to justify such action doesn't outweigh the harm that would be caused by the removal of a nationally significant tree. Persimmon has the right to appeal against the decision.

Plans for 147 affordable homes in ancient Sykes Lane

Pictured above is the site plan for Yorkshire Housing's proposed development of 147 urgently-needed affordable homes in fields either side of tranquil Sykes Lane. The project, which has been submitted to Bradford council for approval, is adjacent to the  Weavers View estate of mixed-tenure affordable homes built by Yorkshire Housing on the former Riverside Works and Becks Mill site in Keighley Road opposite the Aldi supermarket.

Sykes Lane, next to the canal, for many years was home to an old-fashioned mix of pens, smallholdings, allotments, stables, buildings, shelters and sheds of the kind pictured above. It was also the site of the town's first recreation ground, opened in 1914, before the park was created in 1934. Records indicate the lane was in existence by 1565 (see my blog of February 24th, 2021).

The plans show that a new footpath would be created from the canal towpath to join Sykes Lane (pictured above), which is designated as ancient highway and will be retained in one form or another as a pedestrian route.

Yorkshire Housing's Weavers Walk development of 156 mixed-tenure affordable homes, built by Lindum, of York, fronts Keighley Road (pictured above). The estate runs west towards Sykes Lane and will be adjacent to the proposed new development, for which Yorkshire Housing's construction partner is the Vistry Group. Vistry describes itself as the country's largest home-builder.

Yorkshire Housing is a not-for-profit association and with its subsidiary Space Homes manages more than 20,000 homes for rent and low-cost home ownership. The Weavers Walk estate is pictured above in the foreground. Keighley Road can be seen on the right at the bottom of the picture. The line of trees bottom left behind the new homes is in Sykes Lane. The public can have their say online by using Bradford council's planning portal (reference 25/02807/MAF). There are more than 100 documents relating to the planning application, including reports by the council's countryside and rights of way service, the trees team and landscape architects.

What a hoot! Huge Silsden turn-out cheers charity run by more than 200 decorated tractors

It had to be seen to be believed: Rudolph's Run by more than 200 tractors, seasonally decorated, to raise money for the Sue Ryder Manorlands hospice and the Yorkshire Air Ambulance.

Crowds lined Kirgate on the Sunday solstice evening to welcome the tractors on their way from Otley to Skipton. The tractors festively sparkled and joyously sounded hooters, sirens and claxons.

Organised by the Lothersdale Agricultural Discussion Group, this was the fifth annual Rudolph's Run.

The crowds had waited patiently for the procession to arrive. The tractors left Otley at around 6pm, arrived in Silsden around 7.30pm and were due to travel through Steeton, Sutton, Kildwick and Bradley before finishing in Skipton.

Looking back on Hothfield School's impressive commitment to wildlife and to fruit and veg growing

Hothfield Junior School's frontage was transformed into a showpiece wildlife walk and garden in 2009 thanks to the vision of the then head teacher Mrs Ruth Leech with the immense support of  Crabtree Care Homes.

Mrs Leech, who was acting head of Hothfield for a year before becoming head from 2006 to 2011, is pictured above at the official opening of the wildlife walk with (from left) Neil Whitaker, who was chairman of the governors, Brian Madden, who designed and created the walk and garden, and Bob Thomas, who played a key part in turning Hothfield's School Street site into a fruit and vegetable garden.

Brian Madden's imaginative design (pictured above) gave the garden an attractive mix of perennials and shrubs, a water feature and a seating area for learning and leisure.

Mr Madden was in charge of maintenance for Crabtree Care Homes, which included (and still does) the Raikes in Bradley Road. He was also a talented artist and went on to be based in Glasgow, specialising in nautically-themed paintings.

The wildlife garden (pictured above as it is now) has become overgrown since Hothfield Junior School vacated the site nearly four years ago. Hothfield and Aire View Infants merged in 2017 to become Silsden Primary School, which moved to new premises in Hawber Cote Lane in January 2022. The old schools are to be demolished. Outline plans for 25 houses to be built on the Hothfield site and for 23 homes at Aire View are being considered by Bradford council. The Hothfield building supports a well-established and ecologically significant house-martin colony, which the council's biodiversity team says must be safeguarded.

Pupils dig in to create a fruit and veg garden

While the wildlife walk was being created in Hothfield Street, the School Street side of the site was being transformed into a fruit and veg garden. This was another of head teacher Ruth Leech's inspirational projects to put pupils in touch with nature and to learn where fruit and veg came from and how produce was grown. Pictured above are the pioneering pupils of the school Gardening Club who got the garden under way, supervised by members of Silsden Allotment Association and helped by parents and grandparents.

Carrots were among the first crops grown at the new garden to supply the school kitchen. In the picture above is Mr Bob Thomas, of Silsden Allotment Association, who played a leading part in helping the children establish the garden. Bob was a pupil at the old Silsden Secondary Modern School, which included the schools's own allotments in Hothfield Street and which supplied the kitchen during and after the lean war years.

Pictured above are the Gardening Club's second line-up of members and helpers, who developed the project, bolstered by Morrison's donation of a greenhouse. Several local businesses donated goods and services to help the garden flourish, including Airedale Tree Surgeons, who supplied wood for the raised beds.

A long-term mainstay of the garden was Mr Jim Walker, pictured above, a grandad of one of the pupils. His contribution and knowledge were outstanding and he went on to run the garden for several years. Jim died aged 83 in 2022.

The fruit and veg garden was created from scratch on this unused grassed area. As can be seen from the picture below, the site is now overgrown, although two apple trees planted in the early days of the Gardening Club have continued to fruit each year.

Stand-out tree suffers damage as builders challenge preservation order

Persimmon, which is building 138 homes on farmland between Brown Bank Lane and Hawber Cote, is applying to completely fell the iconic ash tree, pictured above, which is protected by a preservation order. Since Persimmon's September application, the tree, which is thought to be around 150 years old and has escaped the ravages of ash die-back disease, lost a major arm, and half of its splendour, apparently in recent high winds.  

This picture above shows the tree in winter last year; the following picture shows how it is now after leaf-fall and minus a limb.

The ash stood sentinel above two fields where four immensely popular public footpaths converge. The development will destroy all the pastoral charms that have been cherished by generations of local walkers. 

Above: a community walk in May, accompanied by a giant model of a curlew, celebrated the nature of the Hawber fields and lamented all that will be lost. The picture shows walkers and curlew on the footpath towards the ash tree newly in leaf. 

Meanwhile the Persimmon project proceeds apace. The pictures above and below show the site as viewed from the public footpath alongside the Bolton Road allotments. 

Finally, a pictorial reminder of how the site used to be.

 And this is only the start.....

Work is under way in the field alongside Bolton Road near the junctions with North Street and Brown Bank Lane, preparing the way for Persimmon's development of 138 homes on the popularly walked farmland between here and Hawber Cote.

The picture above shows the same field in June 2021.  Hard to believe that Bradford councillors approved the upmarket housing estate without even visiting the fields, most of which are crossed by public footpaths, to see why the area has been treasured by generations of Silsdeners.   The destructive power of earth-shifting machines and the development that is to come will leave only memories of nature that was abundant with wildflowers, trees, songbirds and hedgerows.

Sheep used to graze in the buttercup-rich meadow which will soon be developed. The houses here will abut the Bolton Road allotments. The two pictures below tell their own story.

Not a murmuration but a perturbation of swooping starlings

A vast flock of starlings provided a spectacular aerial display over the fields in the Walton Hole area of Cringles Lane on March 11th.

At times they tumbled in such packed profusion to almost resemble a swarm of giant bees. Just as suddenly they reassembled in a frame-filling airborne dash before swooping low left and then right, barely clearing the stone-wall tops.

Incredible aerial displays, called murmurations, at dusk are one of nature's highlights in the colder months but this flock was restlessly on the wing at midday, maybe a rehearsal or perhaps stirred by the prospect of soil invertebrates to feed on in nearby fields newly spread with farmyard manure.