Carlton Marsh

 The Origin of Carlton Marsh & Ringing (continued)

In 1977 BMBC started landfilling part of Pool Ings near Monckton Pit stack. By 1982, the refuse tip was beginning to attract wintering Icelandic, ‘White-winged Gulls. So, some of our younger birders started to watch the site. John Clarkson, Peter Senior and Jeff Cattle found Iceland and Glaucous Gulls feeding there. Keith and I, along with Richard and Robert Laverack, made many visits until the site was closed in 1992.

Meanwhile back at the reserve, one of our biggest challenges was the dispute over the disused Hull & Barnsley Railway and marshalling yard that was leased to BMBC as part of the nature reserve. The adjacent scrapyard owners claimed it was theirs. In their wisdom, in 1985 British Rail decided to sell it, including the old railway embankment we used as a footpath, to several Boulder Bridge scrapyard owners. An agreement was reached, with BMBC to allow the extraction of ash to go ahead with the proviso that the site be given over to the nature reserve after the work was completed. In 1990 two ponds were created and a wildflower mix was put on the land to create a wildflower meadow.

That said, the scrappers held on to the deeds and claimed it was still theirs. This argument with the scrappers rolled on until it came to a head in February 2013, when they blocked all entrances to the railway embankment with posts and barb wire and signs saying ‘Keep Out’. The police were brought in, but the scrappers objected saying they were biased against them. Our group members, at their own risk, removed the barb wire and carried on as usual.

Time moved on and in November 2018, after months of building a case with the BMBC solicitor, I went with her as a witness for BMBC, on the 5.30am train to Manchester where the case was heard in a court there. Unfortunately, the scrappers had a top London Barrister representing them, and he ran rings around the BMBC Barrister, by his own admission. However, nothing was decided that day, apparently that was only part one.

Nothing more happened until both parties got together and came to an out of court financial settlement in August 2019. Finally, after 33 years of constantly looking over our shoulders, in case we were whacked with a baseball bat, the dispute was over and the land given over to BMBC as part of the nature reserve. Phew! We have had no trouble since.

Carlton Marsh

A Raven called as it flew over at 10.15hrs (JP). 

Also of note 2 Goldcrests, 4 Linnets west, 3 Meadow Pipits south, c20 Siskins were feeding on Alder seeds, 3 Water Rails called, 6 Shoveler were present, along with 15 Greylags and an adult Common Gull. An unseen skein of Pink Feet Geese were heard going over north of the reserve (R. Laverack/CG). 

Butterflies included 2 Red Admirals, 9 Speckled Wood, 4 Small Copper and an unidentified White species. 18 Common Daters, 3 Migrant Hawkers and 5 Willow Emeralds were enjoying the sunshine around mid-day (C. Parkin),

                                      Male Great Tit 

                                            Male Reed Bunting

                                          Siskin (the first ringed since 1997) 

 The Origins of Carlton Marsh & Ringing

On 10^th January 2018 a Channel 4 News crew arrived with Pete Wall to film our Willow Tits. It was raining a little and the light was poor, but to the delight of Channel 4’s science Editor, Tom Clarke, the crew managed to film two colour ringed Willow Tits coming to a feeder I had put out an hour earlier. When it was all put together, the broadcast lasted about several minutes and featured Teresa May at the London Wetland Centre talking about her vision for the next 25 years. She spoke about the necessity to remove plastic from the environment and about improving habitats for wildlife. The programme was televised just after 7pm on 11^th January 2018. Tom Clarke described the reserve as a ‘National treasure’. He moved on to work for ITV News and then to Sky News.

In March 2018, the Editor of Countryfile, Rebecca Pratt, visited. She wanted to know if the programme could feature Willow Tits being ringed and fitted with a transmitter, but the RSPB were reluctant to allow the process to be filmed.

The sedentary nature of the bird meant that the furthest distance one was tracked at any of the sites was just over a kilometre.

The sad part is, before we could establish why they were disappearing so rapidly, for reasons that are still unclear, they had completely disappeared from the lowlands of Barnsley by 2019/20.

It could be that climate change has interfered with their food supply, and or their physiology, as a few retreated to higher ground west of the M1. We do know that the odd pair came to a feeder on the moorland fringe on the Ingbirchworth and Scout Dike Reservoirs up until 2023.

Blue Tit, Great, and Great Spotted Woodpecker have all increased due to supplementary feeding by us, thereby creating much more competition for nest sites for Willow Tit during the breeding season.

Another Channel 4 News crew arrived on Sunday 12^th January 2020, almost two years to the day since their previous visit. They came to do a piece on Willow Tits again. It was raining for the first couple of hours, but after it stopped, Geoff Carr and I managed to erect a 40ft mist net near the feeder, to try and catch a Willow Tit for them. Sadly, they were nowhere to be seen, and I feared then that we had lost them. None were being reported from Worsbrough Reservoir or Old Moor at the time.

Yorkshire Wildlife Trust’s, Sophie Pinder was interviewed by Claire Fallon about Willow Tits and their requirements. The programme was aired on Channel 4 News between 7pm and 8pm on Wednesday 15^th January 2020 in a piece about HS2, which was scheduled to pass through the edge of the reserve. They used footage of our Willow Tits from their previous visit.

Sadly, for all the time and effort that was put in to catching them, it was to no avail. I will not easily forget the very cold early mornings we endured during those winters.

To be continued

Carlton Marsh

5 Shoveler and 4 Teal were amongst the wildfowl.

Dragonflies included 2 Migrant Hawkers and 1 Willow Emerald (C. Parkin). 

The origins etc of Carlton Marsh - Bird Ringing continued 

Bird ringing began here in the autumn of 1975 by Philip Bright Wordsworth, after Keith and I discovered a large Meadow Pipit and Corn Bunting roost, a meadow roost, the like we have not witnessed since. However, this left Phil eager to return in in the summer of 1976 and ringing activity continued with Phil training Keith and I. Phil described the ringing ride he made as the best single net site he had ever worked.

In March 1977 I was fortunate to be in the right place to see a male Dartford Warbler climbing through the Bulrushes. I ran to Cudworth to a red telephone box to inform Phil, who came the following morning and ringed it. At the next BBSG meeting, it was described by Mike Pysden as the ‘The bird of the century’. It had never been recorded in Yorkshire before.

After Keith and I made the discovery of a Reed Bunting and Corn Bunting roost at Monckton (now part of Rabbit Ings) Keith, Phil, Peter Senior and I began a winter campaign in 1977 to catch as many as we could as they came in at dusk. Over the next 7 winters more than 600 Reed Buntings, 52 Corn Buntings, Pied Wagtail and Yellow Buntings were ringed until the reed beds flooded preventing further trapping in 1984/85. It was hard though as we had to tramp the steel poles from my home in Cudworth with all the ringing equipment. During that time there were just 2 recoveries of Reed Bunting, one from York and one from Lancashire. There were no Corn Bunting recoveries. Soon after this the population of Corn Bunting crashed due to intensive farming so that none bred at Carlton Marsh after 1986.

I helped train Dave Smith in 1984 and he became a dedicated part of the team until he retired from ringing in 2013. He caught a splendid Icterine Warbler near the hide in September 1988, the first for South Yorkshire.

Since then, I have ringed an average of 185 birds a year just to keep it going. A combined total of more than 24,000 birds have been ringed by us all since 1975 with birds recovered in several countries in Europe and Africa.

On 15^th November 2017, I met Vivien Hartwell and Paul Bellamy, from the RSPB, with a view to implementing the ‘Back from the Brink’ Willow Tit project.

Willow Tit is a sedentary species that has disappeared from many parts of the country over recent years. We often had up to 4 pairs. This scheme hoped to find out what their requirements were and to create wet woodland habitat along wildlife friendly corridors to save them from further decline.

What followed, on the 28^th of November, at Carlton Marsh, was a ringing session to try and catch Willow Tits to colour-ring them. We managed to catch and colour-ring 3 that day, and 2 more near the wader scrape on 6^thDecember. Some were fitted with a radio transmitter, which had a life span of around two weeks. It was Vivien’s job to track them with her H shaped aerial. The scheme was also being run at RSPB Old Moor by Dave Waddington and Worsbrough Reservoir by Geoff Carr. All the colour-ringed birds at Carlton Marsh were fitted with a red plastic ring above the BTO metal ring on the right leg, denoting our site. Other colours were used on their left legs. Yorkshire Wildlife Trust put up many suitable logs and nest boxes at all three sites.

                                     Willow Tit (CG)