Holden Vale Flash (Bleach Works) & Its Little Ringed Plovers.

" When all them years ago, we stood in front of the bulldozers to stop the destruction of the Little Ringed Plover site, and after negotiation with the LCC Engineer, we actually thought we had won a do for them little birds!!"

These are four photos which I took of when the Lancashire County Council were making the Holden Vale Flash (Clearing the old toxic waste dumping area of the long gone nicknamed "bleach works", or the Holden Vale Manufacturing Co. Ltd a subsidary partner of the corporate giant USA Hercules group. (Please click over photos to enlarge)....

The whole idea had been to try and preserve some resemblance of the original habitat for the continuation of the breeding of the rare Little Ringed Plover, which had successfully bred on this site for each year over a decade, prior to this excavation and rebuild of the area.

Sadly, all went wrong!! the outcome to what was originally proposed, never materialized as it was supposed to do, and consequently it was tragic and devastating to lots of us, to find out that the LRP never used this site again.

Some excellent news is that thankfully in more recent times the LRP has actually bred at another habitat some two miles away.

MORE VINTAGE GRANE PHOTOS

Here is another four vintage Grane photos (from l to r) Click over photos to enlarge)

1) The Bishop of Blackburn opening of Grane Church after move from Crowtrees

2) Ruins of Holden Hall.

3) St Stephens walking day nr to Cemetary gates c1910.

4) Haymaking at Kettlewell Hall, c1910.

RECENT GRANE FUNGI PHOTOS

(Please click over photos to enlarge)

Mike Valentine has kindly sent in the above photos of fungi found at Haslingden Grane this week. 1) Purple Jellydisc (Ascocoryne sarcoides) 2) Ochre Brittlegill (Russula ochroleuca) 3) A Mollisia species - Very tiny, each fruitbody only about 2-3mm across. (Probably Common Grey Disco - Mollisia cinerea, but cann't be 100% positive without microscopy) 4) Wrinkled Crust (Phlebia radiata) 5) Grey Coral -(Clavullina cinerea) Note, this particular patch is being parasitised by n ascomycete fungus called Helminthosphaeria claviorum, which has stunted and deformed the grey coral fungus). 6) Grisette (Amanita vaginata).