Naunton Beauchamp Walk. Worcestershire

We are so lucky to have to various Local Reserves and areas of Special Scientific Interest within a few miles of Upton Snodsbury. Administered by the Worcestershire Wildlife Trust and Butterfly Conservation these are protected areas.

Aside from this the area around Naunton Beauchamp, Grafton Flyford, Flyford Flavell and Upton Snodsbury which has Cowsden with its views over toward Abberon, is dominated by sheep farming and some arable farming.  The landscape is defined as Bishampton Claylands.

Here are some photos from a recent walk from Naunton Beauchamp up Piddle Brook towards North Piddle.Just a snapshot of a typical 1/2 hour walk. What isn't typical are heavy HGVs, trailers with manure and the smells of chicken farms! Tomorrow is the Wychavon Planning Committee Meeting. We hope that common sense prevails...again.

Yellowhammer on the road

Local with his vintage caravan

Local kerbside pears used for making traditional perry

Meadowsheet in the verges (careful cutting preserves these verges)

Quince alongside Piddle Brook

Crataegus otherwise known as Hawthorn berries

Overzealous pruning that took out the buzzards perch

Hedge clearing

Crack willow remnants alongside Piddle Brook after clearance

The typical weekend cyclists drawn to the area for its quiet lanes and attractive village (with normal rural smells, not chickens!)

Dandelion

Speckled Wood

Naunton Beauchamp Village with its no-chicken-farm.org sign

Grafton Flyford Gymkhana

It was a beautiful day for a Gymkhana at the crossroads near Libbery on 31st August 2014

The importance of local events like this can't be over-emphasised. They give these villages a sense of place, an opportunity for villagers to meet up and share a cut of tea and a burger whilst watching the children and ponies compete in various competitions. In the afternoon there is a dog show. It is also an important fund-raiser.

The field that this takes place at is about 750m from the F C Jones & Co application site and just over a kilometre from the Edward Davies site. Aside from the issue of odour if there is a cleanout at the site when an event like this takes place, more importantly this lane is the preferred route for routing traffic onto and off the A422.  What are the effects on the amenity of residents if the 3 million chickens per year developments take place?

Here are some pictures from the event. 

Grafton Woods, the Brown Hairstreak and Bechstein's Bats

A beautiful day at Grafton Woods yesterday. Grafton Woods has the most northerly documented population of Brown Hairstreak Butterflies and the very rare, red-list Bechstein's Bat.

Both of these populations don't go to the edge of the wood and turn back. It isn't a zoo with fences! They use the area around the wood for foraging and for breeding. For the Bechstein's Bat the 2012 survey showed one female going as far as Whitsun Brook by Naunton Beauchamp via Piddle Brook. A distance of 3 kilometres. 

The proposed Broiler Chicken Farms by Edward Davies and Kinsey Hern, who has recently put in an application of an Environmental Permit for 250,000 broiler chickens, would lead to 3 million chickens per year in the area between Naunton Beauchamp and Upton Snodsbury. The sites are about 2 kilometres from Grafton Wood. 

It is a known fact that the deposition of the fine dust which is extracted by fans from the chicken broiler units will have an impact on the area. Eutrophication is the process by which nitrates from agriculture or in this case from the broiler chicken farm change the water quality. The impacts can be a change in the biodiversity of the area as a result.

So, with Brown Hairstreaks and Bechstein Bats you would think that the Ecological report that was produced by Edward Davies' Yorkshire based Ecologist would refer to them. Especially with such important populations and Bechstein Bats being a population of European significance and on the red list of endangered species. 

1) There is NO MENTION of Brown Hairstreak Butterflies on the Ecological Report.

2) There is NO MENTION of the Bechstein Bat on the Ecological Report - Here is the information from the Wold Ecology Report on Bats - 

"Bats

 Currently there is no pre-existing information on bats at the site. 

 Data for the 10km grid square SO95 shows records of brown long-eared Plecotus auritus, noctule Nyctalus noctula, Natterer’s Myotis nattereri, whiskered Myotis mystacinus, soprano pipistrelle Pipistrellus pygmaeus and common pipistrelle Pipistrellus pipistrellus (source – WBRC and NBN Gateway 2013). 

 There are no bat roost records within 1km of the Application Site."

There is no mention of the Bechstein Bat on the Report. Yet the Bechstein's Bat was reported on the BBC as long ago as 2010.  The use of a grid square map be the reason for the omission but if this is the case logic would say that other checks should be made. Especially for a bat on the red list.

In the Report on the Bechstein Bat in 2013  "A STUDY ON THE POPULATION SIZE, FORAGING RANGE AND ROOSTING ECOLOGY 

OF BECHSTEIN’S BATS AT GRAFTON WOOD SSSI WORCESTERSHIRE" was published in January 2013.

Data was definitely available to say that the Bechstein Bat is within 2km of the site. Why did Wold Ecology not find them?  

In 2014 the scarce More recently the Brandt Bat was discovered at Grafton Woods. 

Unfortunately the process of Planning is such that while we can point out errors and ommision to the Council there is little more that we can do. The rest is left with the Council Officer to pursue. Time constraints and a process of planning in favour of development at any cost means these questions are largely seen to be irrelevant.

In respect of the Edward Davies application which will be held on 11th September at 2pm we are now dependent on the Planning Committee to take a view and hopefully take into account some of the reasons for refusal that we have pointed out.

We hope that they will REJECT the Application in favour of local knowledge and the economy of the local area.

Public Footpath to Grafton Woods. There was no Bull! 

Beautiful Grafton Woods