The whole area has become one of peace and beauty, with a wide range of birds seen and nesting on site, as well as a variety of mammals, amphibians and invertebrates. Yet, most importantly, the project is providing those supported by CFL with opportunities to learn to care for and enjoy the countryside, whilst also providing for visiting groups.

Already during 2006, we have had a number of church groups visit, some older persons enjoying the opportunity to be driven around the project in one of our two six-seater golf buggies; others enjoying a gentle walk, followed by a cream tea! Leeds Mental Health has arranged several group visits, as has a local pre-school and a special needs group from a local college.

But Care in Creation is most appreciated by those in the daily care of CFL. Due to the problems they experience, often caused by a painful childhood, it can take quite a while for those in our care to “wake up” to the beauty of the world around them. Few have had opportunities to play in the countryside as children and it is wonderful to see their eyes gradually being opened to the intricate detail of a wild flower, or to the majesty of a soaring bird of prey.

Most importantly, the conservation area, along with all the farm’s facilities, provides a peaceful setting in which deeply hurting people can begin to recover from a painful past and everything they see around them points to a loving Creator.

Alan has begun to take such an interest in bird watching that he now has a pair of binoculars and enjoys regular trips down to the valley with Mike, the Workshop project leader, to see what species they can spot. Three times each week, a group of the young ladies walk around the whole conservation and farm area, filling up feeders at the many wild bird feeding stations. This is a labour of love but it has sustained the wide variety and large numbers of birds on site.

Watching out for Spring!
Each spring, we hold our own “Spring Watch” competition, offering prizes for the first people to spot various birds, flowers or other creatures! This year, the competition has been fierce, with young people rushing to let us know who spotted the first frogspawn, swallow or hawthorn blossom. Spring has been late this year with the very cold weather in March, but the signs of spring have not been missed.

Our prize-winners thus far this year are as follows:
Joe .. Daffodil: 14/03/06
Alan .. Frogspawn: 26/03/06
David .. Curlew: 29/03/06
Christine, Deborah and Wendy .. Blackthorn blossom: 29/03/06
Alan .. Hare: 29/03/06
Kate and Mark .. Bumblebee: 31/03/06
Kate .. Peacock butterfly:13/04/06
Kelly .. Swallow: 18/04/06
Kate and Maxine .. Hawthorn blossom: 19/05/06

As yet, no one has spotted the swifts (although they have been back for two weeks) and the cuckoo has not been heard, so prizes are still “up for grabs”! The competition has really helped to raise the awareness of those in our care to seasonal changes in the countryside. Kate identified the peacock butterfly all on her own and was so keen to identify it that she was found upside down in a pile of horticultural equipment, peering over into an area in the polytunnels to look down at the butterfly, which was definitely the right species!

With spring now truly here, we have a lovely display of marsh marigolds, celandines, wood sorrel, wild garlic, bluebells, stitchwort, pink purslane and red campion. Large flowered bittercress is flowering in all the ponds and the first yellow flag (iris) is out.

Work undertaken in winter 05/06
With a great deal of assistance from volunteers, including our regular volunteers, Malcolm, Brian and David, also teams from Wates and the Halifax, maintenance work was undertaken on all the ponds and some of the scrapes. This included cutting back excessive reed mace, removing dying pond marginal plants to avoid the water being over-enriched with decaying vegetation and adding hessian barley straw sacks for blanket weed prevention

Further triple thorn hedging was planted and a fairly large number of trees planted out. Kerb granules were used on all the young hedgerows and round the trees to inhibit grass growth and yellow rattle was sown on the wildflower bank, to try to inhibit the really vigorous-growing grasses. The wildflower bank was also cut back hard and raked, to encourage the cowslips and other wild flowers to come through in the spring. We have been rewarded with a lovely display of cowslips.

A large amount of gorse was cut back to encourage the growth of wild flowers, as the gorse was taking over in some areas. Until this spring, very little wood sorrel had been seen in the conservation area, but with the gorse cut back, whole banks of this wild flower have appeared!

Current conservation work is centred on keeping certain areas of grassland mown, so that visitors can see where to walk when off the set paths; on species monitoring and welcoming visiting groups. It is also now time to once again remove vast quantities of himalayan balsam, an invasive species. Despite pulling up hundreds of plants last year, certain areas are full of the young plants, which have to be carefully removed to avoid damage to bluebells.

It has been wonderful to see how those supported by Caring For Life have enjoyed looking out for signs of spring this year. We look forward to spending many happy hours with them in the Care in Creation area in the summer months, learning more about the amazing world around us and seeing everywhere the handiwork of a loving Heavenly Father.