The Shire Brook Valley Local Nature Reserve is located in

Sheffield Sheffield is a city status in the United Kingdom, city in South Yorkshire, England, whose name derives from the River Sheaf which runs through it. The city serves as the administrative centre of the City of Sheffield. It is Historic counties o ...

, England, on a former

brownfield In urban planning, brownfield land is any previously developed land that is not currently in use. It may be potentially contaminated, but this is not required for the area to be considered brownfield. The term is also used to describe land prev ...

industrial site.

Development

The Local Nature Reserve was designated in 1999 and extends over an area of approximately 100 hectares. ShirebrookValleyVisitorsCenter

It is based around the former site of the Coisley Hill Sewage Works which closed in the early 1990s. The manager's office has been converted into a visitors' centre. The reserve includes Beighton Marsh, an area of reed-grass swamp situated at its eastern end, which supports birds such as

Reed Bunting The common reed bunting (''Emberiza schoeniclus'') is a passerine bird in the bunting family Emberizidae, a group now separated by most modern authors from the finches, Fringillidae. The genus name ''Emberiza'' is from Old German ''Embritz'', a ...

Grasshopper Warbler The grass warblers are small passerine birds belonging to the genus ''Locustella''. Formerly placed in the paraphyletic "Old World warbler" assemblage, they are now considered the northernmost representatives of a largely Gondwanan family, the ...

and

Barn Owl The barn owl (''Tyto alba'') is the most widely distributed species of owl in the world and one of the most widespread of all species of birds, being found almost everywhere except for the polar and desert regions, Asia north of the Himalaya ...

, as well as mammals such as the Harvest Mouse and Water Vole. The Birley Spa Bath House, a Grade II listed building, was restored with a Heritage Lottery Fund grant in 2001. Also within the reserve is Wickfield Plantation, one of the few remaining areas of lowland heath and coppiced oak woodland inside

. The reserve contains Carr Forge Dam which is fed by a stream from Birley Spa and is a location for wildlife. New ponds were created in the same area to mark the centenary of the City of Sheffield. The Centenary Ponds were opened by

Clive Betts Clive James Charles Betts (born 13 January 1950) is a British Labour Party politician and former economist, who was the Member of Parliament (MP) for Sheffield Attercliffe from 1992 to 2010 and is the current MP for the successor seat of She ...

on 18 June 1993. Further ponds were created in 2016 to encourage amphibians. Also added to the eastern side of the reserve is a landscaped former landfill site, called Linley Bank Meadow, now home to skylarks and a likely location for soaring buzzards. The reserve is popular with cyclists and walkers, having a network of paths and the Transpennine Trail running through is used by a running club, for orienteering events, geocaching, company team-building days, school visits etc. The reserve has a car-park accessed from Stone Lane. Fishing is banned on the site as most access points involve walking under pylons which has resulted in fishing rods conducting electricity and burning anglers. After one bad accident in 2004, the council took the unusual step of removing all the fish from the site to deter anglers. This decision was criticised by the Countryside Alliance.

Carr Forge Dam

Carr Forge Dam is a dam located in the centre of the reserve. The dam dates back to the

Tudor dynasty The House of Tudor was a royal house of largely Welsh and English origin that held the English throne from 1485 to 1603. They descended from the Tudors of Penmynydd and Catherine of France. Tudor monarchs ruled the Kingdom of England and it ...

, and most of the brickwork still remains. The dam is now mainly used as a wildlife pond, with toads, frogs and other species including the endangered Great Crested Newt breeding in the marshes.

Shirebrook Heritage Group

The Shirebrook Heritage Group was established in 1999 to maintain the Valley and its visitor's centre. They run a

Park Ranger A ranger, park ranger, park warden, or forest ranger is a law enforcement person entrusted with protecting and preserving parklands – national, state, provincial, or local parks. Description "Parks" may be broadly defined by some systems in thi ...

programme and hold regular meetings within the

Birley Spa Birley Spa is a grade-II listed community bath hall and a Victorian bathhouse in the Hackenthorpe district of the City of Sheffield, England. History The bath house was built for Charles Herbert Pierrepont, 2nd Earl Manvers and the Lord of t ...

bath house and the visitor's centre itself.

Shire Brook Valley Conservation Group

Volunteers formed the group in 1989 and have been at the forefront in carrying out habitat conservation work on the nature reserve on a weekly/monthly basis, meeting on Wednesday and Saturday mornings.

References

External links

Shire Brook Valley walking leaflet
Parks in Sheffield Local Nature Reserves in South Yorkshire {{Protected-area-stub