A gray male drifts slowly throughout the moorland. No, not me, however a giant, lovely hen harrier, scouting for love, or breakfast. I’ve solely been right here 10 minutes, and I’m in a light state of shock. Aren’t these treasured, threatened birds of prey so vanishingly uncommon that seeing one is vastly inconceivable?
I’m strolling with Sonja Ludwig, RSPB species and habitats officer for the Forest of Bowland, and she knows these harriers. “They’re ‘conventional’ birds,” she says. “They have a tendency to come back again to roughly the identical place. We all the time see them right here. Rookies all the time discover the males first. Their plumage, white rump and the black recommendations on the wings are unmistakable.”
Hen harriers are generally nicknamed “gray ghosts” or “ghosts of the moor”. After I spot a second male above the moor high, I’m delighted. “Now you need to attempt to discover the feminine,” says Ludwig.
We scan some extra and, remarkably, after just some minutes, there she is, brown and white, all striations and streaks – and an owlish face when seen from the entrance.
“I’ve acquired them effectively educated, haven’t I?” says Ludwig.
I gained’t share a grid reference. Hen harriers – the most persecuted bird of prey in these islands – want peace and safety, particularly in spring, once they pair up, nest and rear chicks. The important thing level is, if you wish to see them, they’re proper right here. As Ludwig places it: “Bowland takes a little bit of effort. Hillwalkers prefer it, nevertheless it’s probably not the form of place the place you roll up in a automobile and light-weight a conveyable barbecue by the roadside.”
The Forest of Bowland intrigues me. I see it each morning from the kitchen, having relocated to an space simply exterior the nationwide panorama (previously referred to as an space of excellent pure magnificence) 4 years in the past. I drive by way of it to get to Lancaster when the M6 is jammed, and generally motor alongside its edges en path to the Yorkshire Dales or Lake District, the 2 nationwide parks on both aspect of Bowland. However I don’t go there typically, and I’m not alone – it’s in all probability essentially the most neglected, bypassed rural panorama within the north of England. The Lakes get 18 million guests a yr, the Dales greater than 6.5 million; Bowland doesn’t file customer numbers, however traditionally it was within the tens of thousands – regardless of being simply north of densely populated east Lancashire and near Preston and Blackpool.
There’s one thing mysterious about this panorama. Shaped by historic seas, glaciation and erosion, and formed by moist and windy climate, the Bowland Fells seem like a cross between moorland and mountain massif. They’re lined in heather and blanket bathroom, not significantly shapely, and the best level, Ward’s Stone, is a mere 561 metres (1,841ft) above sea stage. Pendle Hill, an outlier of the nationwide panorama, is extra good-looking than any of the fells.
Strolling alongside the upper paths is a bit like being on a raised steppe, barren-looking and uncovered to the weather. When artist Rob St John, who’s creating a collection of installations for the nationwide panorama beneath the title Are You Lost?, requested native individuals who didn’t routinely go to the world what they imagined it was like, their solutions have been typically alongside the traces of “bleak”, “scary” and “chilly”.
Entry is a problem. The north-south Bentham to Chatburn highway takes a highish line by way of agricultural areas. Extra dramatic – and trafficked – is the winding, diagonal highway by way of the Trough of Bowland, the geological characteristic of the area that many know. Different roads skirt Bowland or instantly peter out into bike/strolling tracks, as occurs with the Roman highway between Slaidburn and Hornby. Parking is restricted and bus providers few – although the number 11 bus, launched a yr in the past, has been an enormous success, connecting a number of the most scenic spots with Clitheroe and Settle, which have railway stations.
In September 2004, a lot of Bowland was opened as much as walkers for the primary time when the Countryside and Rights of Method Act 2000 gave common proper of entry to the general public to “entry land” for the needs of open-air recreation on foot. However individuals can solely stroll, run and – the place permitted – trip bikes the place there are paths. A lot of Bowland’s upland areas are boggy and solely the hardy, or foolhardy, would wish to negotiate steep-sided cloughs (valleys) and slopes cloaked in knee-deep heather, riven by deep gullies.
However restricted entry and smallish customer numbers deliver advantages for nature. A big central part of the 775 sq km (300 sq miles) of the nationwide panorama is designated as a website of particular scientific curiosity due to the habitats it protects and its internationally essential chook populations, significantly the hen harrier and merlin. The latter is the UK’s smallest chook of prey, in regards to the measurement of a thrush. I in all probability wouldn’t have noticed one throughout my go to if Ludwig didn’t know the place to look. With binoculars, we might simply determine a greyish dot seated – pointedly – on high of an previous grouse butt.
As I used to be focusing, one other chook flashed throughout the valley the place we have been seated. It was a male peregrine falcon, apparently returning to a nesting space the place a feminine was both incubating eggs or readying the positioning to put them. I had by no means seen a peregrine earlier than, although I had seen their meals refuse in city areas. To observe the quickest chook on this planet – able to 240mph throughout a searching dive – slowing right down to salute its mate was particular.
Whereas looking for the birds of prey, I noticed loads of different species: meadow pipits, skylarks, curlews, a stonechat, a greylag goose. The star flip was a few ring ouzels – a red-listed (that means “of excessive conservation concern”) member of the thrush household that dwells on the uplands. As spring rolls on, keen-eyed birders will see, within the reedbeds and on heathlands, pied flycatcher, redstart, wooden warbler, lapwing and uncommon black grouse – plus widespread sandpiper and dipper down on the riverbanks. Bowland additionally helps a big colony of lesser black-backed gull, for which the UK is an internationally essential territory.
Components of Bowland are used for pushed grouse capturing between August and December. A divisive pastime, it arouses passions amongst conservationists. Yearly raptors are illegally killed in areas the place shoots are frequent, and in late 2024 considered one of Bowland’s feminine hen harriers disappeared “in suspicious circumstances”, regardless of being fitted with a satellite tv for pc tag. Whereas Bowland has an extended historical past as a searching space – the traditional phrase “forest” refers to a royal searching floor moderately than tree cowl – the grouse-hunting enterprise started in the midst of the nineteenth century. It’s the administration of the fells for the rearing of the shooters’ targets – little crimson grouse, whose effervescent calls I heard typically as we walked – that has formed the Bowland we see immediately.
However JMW Turner’s sketches of the Trough and different areas, from 1816 – pre-dating trendy moorland administration – present bare-topped fells and only some native timber on the becks and lowest slopes. The truth is, most upland timber have been in all probability felled when agriculture arrived hundreds of years in the past, and the Normans didn’t require tree cowl once they first created the searching grounds for deer.
What Bowland presents is just not gushing magnificence, photogenic peaks or well-trodden footpaths, however moments of wildness in a man-made (the gender is just not unintended) panorama. Visiting it, in addition to a easy pleasure in itself, is a manner of staking a declare on behalf of the area’s most susceptible inhabitants – the raptors.
The “summit” of my mini-safari with Ludwig was when the male hen harrier started to carry out what is named a sky dance. Towards a giant, clear-blue backdrop and above a patch of chocolate-coloured heather the place a feminine lurked, he shot upwards and started to pirouette, after which fall, after which flip, and twist and, frankly, showcase like billyo – to impress her, to warn youthful males to remain away and, maybe, as a result of flying like that should really feel simply ace.
Obtain walks and biking routes here. The Eco Escapes guide has options for car-free visits, whereas the most recent official Discover Bowland information has a characteristic on all-terrain wheelchair walks
