Dalton Bank Nature Reserve

When a steep twenty-hectare site on the edge of Huddersfield became surplus to industrial requirements a chance was spotted to restore its natural beauty and create a fantastic resource for local residents and schools.

Work started on the development of Dalton Bank Local Nature Reserve in 1992. Funding was provided by Syngenta, owners of the land, and by the local authority and Kirklees Metropolitan Council and Environmental Alliance. Grants also came from the Countryside Agency and the Forestry Commission. Since then the partnership has involved the whole local community in transforming the site into accessible countryside.

The improvements have encouraged wildlife to come back to the land and have given visitors, including many schoolchildren, the opportunity to see woodland birds, hares, badgers and foxes in their natural habitat.

Within three years, the site was sufficiently improved to be formally designated a Local Nature Reserve by Kirklees Metropolitan Council and English Nature. In November 1997, the Yorkshire Wildlife Trust awarded the Yorkshire Environmental Award to the site. Then, in June 2000, the reserve received the UK Man and the Biosphere Urban Wildlife Award for Excellence.

With this list of awards already to its name, English Nature approved a £21,000 Wildspace! grant in 2002 to develop a programme of environmental education, linked to local schools and young people, and to help establish a Friends of Dalton Bank group. Wildspace! grants are targeted to support visitor-friendly projects which will act as examples of best practice from which others can learn. The funding is provided by the Lottery operator Camelot. It presented the site with a blue plaque, as part of scheme launched in 2003 to highlight where £14 billion in lottery cash has been spent over the last 10 years.