School Holidays 6 - Yorkshire day 4

Tuesday 11th
Another fine day on Tuesday saw us heading out for the moors and maybe in search of a dipper on one of the rivers. We decided to stop by the side of the road on a part of Kildale Moor, surrounded by heather, and head up towards a dry stone wall and beyond, if only for a stretch of our legs and some fresh air. One of the boys startled a few grouse, but we saw little else to start with. Even this high on the moors, there were still parts of the ground that were quite wet and boggy, so we had to be careful where we walked. A gap in the wall allowed us to traverse it with ease, but beyond yielded little more than we had already seen, although the views were expansive and quite awesome.

It was on the way back down to the car that Alastair discovered a rather large toad, almost black in colour, but handsome nevertheless. I took a few photos, one of which was on some whitened moss, looking almost artificial against his dark skin.

I then found some cotton grass, but didn’t notice the caterpillar under the cottonhead until I was looking at the photo at home in the evening. (See this thread http://www.wildaboutbritain.co.uk/fo...terpillar.html)As Alastair was looking for a suitable place to re-home his toad, he discovered a rather large area covered in Sundew plants. There were lots of these amazing plants, with their red sticky traps and a few with flower or seed heads on.

We returned to the car, where we ate our lunch before heading on to Danby, for a welcome cup of tea. While Julia and I were drinking our tea, the boys rolled around on the grassy slope, but not before Alastair had discovered a newt under some grass, and Aaron had found a lovely large yellowy frog in amongst some nettles, and so unfortunately out of reach. We drove on to Lealholm, and while Julia slept on the grass by the bridge the boys played in the river, and I had a paddle with my camera to see if there was anything exciting around. The only excitement was a pint of Black Sheep from the pub followed later by a rum and raisin ice cream! A rather twisty route took us (via a ford) to Goathland where we happened to see a large collection of owls and birds of prey in a field by the side of the road. We pulled over and the owner was happy to let us hold some of the birds and photograph them, for which we made a suitable donation. Jordan decided he would like to hold Gizmo, the White-faced Scops Owl, Alastair held the Snowy Owl, Aaron held the Peregrine and Julia held a rather large Rough-legged Hawk. Aaron also held the Gyr Falcon and Alastair got to hold the Peregrine too. I didn’t hold any, but was really pleased with some of the photos, and did have my finger nibbled gently by Ben, the Little Owl, so I came away with some good memories. We had tea in Sleights before heading back home, spotting a Barn owl on Newton Mulgrave Moor and a flock of Lapwings near Liverton Moor on a burning stubble field, as it was being ploughed up.
(photo taken at 19:56)
No dippers again today, but not for lack of trying, and a good day all the same.