A Survey of Waxcap Grasslands in the West Pennine Moors Psssi 2012 - 2013
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A survey of waxcap grasslands in the West Pennine Moors pSSSI 2012 - 2013 a report for Natural England by Graeme Skelcher Ecological Consultant 8 Coach Road Warton, Carnforth Lancashire LA5 9PP 01524 720243 [email protected] http://graemeskelcher.sharepoint.com December 2013 CONTENTS 1 Introduction 3 Map 1: Location of sites within the West Pennine Moors pSSSI which were investigated for grassland fungi 4 2 Methods 5 3 Results 6 Table 1: Waxcap species recorded at surveyed fields in the West Pennine Moors, autumn 2012 and 2013 8 Table 2: Other target fungi species recorded at surveyed fields in the West Pennine Moors, autumn 2012 and 2013 9 Table 3: Summary of habitats and species found at Surveyed Sites, West Pennine Moors 2012 and 2013 10 Table 4: Summary of habitats and species found at Potential Sites, West Pennine Moors 2012 and 2013 15 Table 5: Historical data for target fungi species recorded at White Coppice Cricket Club 23 4 Discussion 24 4.1 Grassland fungi diversity 24 4.2 International interest 25 5 Conclusion 26 6 References 27 Appendix 1: Maps and completed survey forms for White Coppice Cricket Club and The Lowe Appendix 2: Maps and completed survey forms for Siddow Fold and Nr Taylor's Farm Appendix 3: Maps and completed survey forms for Roddlesworth 1 and Roddlesworth 2 Appendix 4: Maps and completed survey forms for Cadshaw and Sunnyhurst Appendix 5: Map and completed survey form for Haslingden Grane (North of Ogden Reservoir) - 2012 only Appendix 6: Maps and completed survey form for Haslingden Grane Site (between Pike Low and Boardman Close) - 2013 only Appendix 7: Map showing visited potential fields Appendix 8: Photographs of notable species ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I am very grateful to Tony Bond, Jeanette Maddy and Tim Rogers (all from the North West Fungus Group - NWFG) and Rich Burkmar and Ben Deed (both from Merseyside Biobank) for carrying out most of the survey work for this project. I am also grateful to Tim Rogers, Jeanette Maddy, Tony Bond and Ken Gartside (NWFG) who provided further expertise by offering opinions on fungi identification from photographs; to Joyce Riley and Irene Ridge (NWFG) and Martyn Ainsworth (Natural England senior fungi specialist) who provided additional information; and to Tony Bond, Jeanette Maddy and Tim Rogers for their constructive comments on a previous draft of this report. 2 1 INTRODUCTION A large area of the West Pennine Moors is being considered by Natural England for designation as a Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI) based on its upland habitats and breeding bird assemblage. Fields within this area are also known to be good for their diversity of grassland fungi; notably the waxcap species Hygrocybe spp.. However, insufficient data exists to determine whether there is sufficient interest for the fungi assemblage to be considered as a reason for designation alongside the habitats and birds. Waxcaps and other grassland fungi provide an indication of lack of improvement of grasslands over many years. They are most commonly associated with the National Vegetation Classification (NVC) communities MG5 Cynosurus cristatus - Centaurea nigra grassland, U4 Festuca ovina - Agrostis capillaris - Galium saxatile grassland, CG1 Festuca ovina - Carlina vulgaris grassland and CG2 Festuca ovina - Avenula pratensis grassland; favour sites which are managed by grazing or frequent mowing to produce a short sward which may stimulate fruiting; and are commonly associated with mosses, notably Rhytidiadelphus squarrosus and Pseudoscleropodium purum (Griffiths et al 2002; see Rodwell 1992 for full NVC community descriptions). Sites rich in grassland fungi are scarce and threatened on a worldwide scale. The UK is a European stronghold for waxcap grasslands (Evans 2003) but they often occur on types of grassland which are botanically relatively poor and have thus been overlooked in the process of SSSI selection (Genney et al 2012). Some of the most important sites in the UK are in upland semi-natural grasslands where habitat loss has been lower (Evans 2003). SSSI guidelines (Genney et al 2012) suggest that SSSI designation should be considered where 12 or more species of waxcap are found in a single visit or where 18 or more are found in multiple visits. The guidelines also recommend consideration of other indicators of important fungi grasslands where the waxcap targets are not met; the Clavariaceae, Entoloma, Geoglossaceae and Dermoloma. SSSI thresholds for total numbers of these species are suggested of five, 12, three and two respectively for multiple visits. For these species, however, it is not considered that meeting the threshold for one of these groups solely would be sufficient, and the more genera/families in this list that exceed their respective threshold, the more confident one can be that the site is special. It is recommended that potential sites should be visited over at least three separate (but not necessarily consecutive) years and at different times during the fruiting season. Work for this report was initially commissioned by Natural England in 2012, to carry out surveys at eight sites which had previously been identified as waxcap grasslands and also to investigate a further 17 sites where presence of waxcaps or potential habitat had recently been reported. Further work was commissioned in 2013 to revisit the best five waxcap sites surveyed in 2012 and to investigate two further sites which were identified as supporting waxcaps just in the autumn of 2013. The data obtained will provide the basis for assessment as to whether grassland fungi should be included as a reason for notification of the SSSI. 3 Haslingden Grane north Gorse Bank, Darwen Sunnyhurst Haslingden Grane west Sunnyhurst Re se rvoir Whenshead Musbury Heights Bold Venture Bury Fold Tockholes Whitehall C Whitehall B The Lowe Whitehall A Roddlesworth 1 White Coppice Cricket Club Roddlesworth 2 Cadshaw Longworth Moor Siddow Fold Map 1: Location of sites within the West Pennine Moors pSSSI which were investigated for grassland fungi Red circles indicate sites which were fully surveyed by expert mycologists during 2012 and 2013 Belmont (Note The Lowe, Sunnyhurst and Cadshaw were excluded from survey in 2013 due to poor results in above Ward's Reservoir 2012) Green circles indicate sites identified as suitable habitat from 2012 vegetation survey Dark Blue circles indicate sites identified for habitat or waxcap presence by Peter Jepson Orange circle indicates waxcap grassland found by John Watt, North West Fungus Group in 2012 nr Taylors Farm Pink circle indicates additional field suggested by Natural England in 2013 Spring Reservoir Light blue circles indicate fields identified as being good for waxcaps during survey of moorland Cote Slack, Rivington fringe vegetation in 2013 Map produced by Graeme Skelcher Ecological Consultant, November 2013 Reproduced by permission of Ordnance Survey on behalf of HMSO. © Crown copyright and database right 2013. 4 2 METHODS Due to the lack of any expert mycological consultant available to undertake this work during the autumn of 2012, the author was employed to coordinate and assist with survey work using volunteer mycologists. This arrangement was continued for further work in the autumn of 2013. Because the potential interest of waxcap grasslands was a late consideration for SSSI designation, it has not been possible to make assessments over a series of three years, as is recommended. The original proposal for this work was that three survey visits should be made to known sites over the autumn of 2012, which would at least be spread to cover the full fruiting season. It was also proposed that the survey would be based on assessment within 30 x 30 m quadrats to provide data which would be consistent with studies elsewhere (e.g. Griffiths et al 2006). However, delays in arranging access to the fields in 2012 meant that survey work could not begin until mid-October - towards the end of the waxcap fruiting season - while the methodology for collection of data was simplified to a basic search of entire fields (or areas of appropriate habitat within fields) to ensure that volunteers could be called upon to carry out the work who were expert mycologists but not necessarily used to undertaking systematic survey work. Experienced mycologists from the North West Fungus Group undertook survey work at the main eight sites. Tony Bond surveyed the White Coppice Cricket Club ground and nearby field The Lowe. Jeanette Maddy surveyed Siddow Fold and Taylor's Farm by Anglezarke Reservoir and Tim Rogers surveyed two fields at Roddlesworth, one at Cadshaw and one at Sunnyhurst. Three visits were made to each of these sites between 18 October and 24 November 2012, except Siddow Fold and Taylor's Farm where only two visits were made due to illness during the final survey period, and the Sunnyhurst site where the habitat was judged by the surveyor to be unsuitable on the initial visit and no further visits were made. Six fields where suitable habitat was identified from a recent vegetation survey of the potential SSSI (Penny Anderson Associates, in prep.) were investigated for their fungi by Rich Burkmar and Ben Deed from Merseyside Biobank, with some additional assessment carried out by Tim Rogers. A further nine additional sites were investigated by the author, which had been identified by local ecologist Peter Jepson as either supporting potential habitat or having waxcaps recently seen. These sites were also visited between mid-October and the end of November. Due to the lack of expertise in fungi identification amongst these latter surveyors, photographs of potentially interesting fungi encountered were distributed to Tim Rogers, Jeanette Maddy, Tony Bond and Ken Gartside, who gave their opinions on identification from the photographs. Two of the sites investigated by Rich Burkmar and Ben Deed, which appeared from photographs to have some fungi interest, were revisited by Tim Rogers.