Community Earth Project

06/05/2026

Bow Bridge Community Meadows at Castleton – Opens with Family Half-Term Event...🌸🎶🌼🌻🥁🌺🎪🌼🎪🎭

The new community nature space in Castleton will be celebrated with a lively, family-friendly event this half-term. The Community Earth Project and 3-Minute Arts invite the public to a Family Folklore & Nature Afternoon at Bow Bridge Community Meadows on Saturday 23 May, 2–4.30pm.

The free event marks the opening of the new community site and offers an imaginative mix of nature, folklore and creative activities for all ages.

Visitors can enjoy maypole dancing, storytelling, craft workshops and hands-on nature activities throughout the afternoon. Highlights include making fairy boats with poetry sails, creating woodland crowns, contributing to a collective poem, and building percussion instruments from natural materials. A light-hearted rhubarb competition will also be judged by the event’s resident ‘Green Man’.

Guided tours of the site will introduce plans for the meadow’s future, including a community orchard and wildflower areas, alongside insights into local history.

The event culminates in a colourful folklore procession along the river, followed by a lively Green Man and May Queen pageant, complete with music, Maypole dancing and the announcement of the rhubarb competition winners.

Please bring a folding chair, enter the rhubarb competition, and dress up if you wish.

Donations are welcome to support the ongoing work of the Community Earth Project.

The event is part of 3-Minute Arts’ Mini Arts Festival, 23–31 May, celebrating community arts around the North York Moors National Park, Coast and Cleveland. For a full programme see: https://3-minutearts.uk/mini-arts-festival

Access and information:�Bow Bridge Community Meadows, Castleton, YO21 2EU is a short walk from Castleton Moor Station and the village centre, with limited parking available nearby. Refreshments will be provided, and public toilets are available in the village.

Safety note: The meadow includes uneven ground and river access; children must be supervised at all times.

Enquiries: [email protected]


North York Moors National Park
The Eskdale - Castleton
Otley 2030
River Esk Connect - REConnect
Esk Valley Camphill Community
Esk Valley Railway

28/02/2026

Last year, during August and September, the North York Moors National Park teamed up with the British Trust for Ornithology to run a project recording bat distribution, surveying land within the North York Moors National Park and following on from earlier work in the Rye Valley. https://www.northyorkmoors.org.uk/nature-recovery/ryevitalise/Citizen-science %20Acoustic%20Monitoring

This Citizen Science survey work uses passive acoustic detector equipment that is set up by volunteers. These frequency-triggered detectors then record for several nights before being collected. The recorded sound files are then uploaded to the BTO Acoustic Pipeline for analysis. https://www.bto.org/data/tools-products/acoustic-pipeline

In September, we hosted one of these acoustic detectors at Bow Bridge Community Meadows. The plan was for one week with a detector in the meadow and a week with one up amongst the trees. The meadow detector recorded for 8 nights but the detector in the trees stopped recording after 5 - by the end of that time the memory card was full up with recordings! This is great news. In fact the area between the trees at Bow Bridge turned out to be the best of a total of 6 sites we surveyed around Castleton and Danby

You can see which bats were detected at Bow Bridge in the photo of a part of the data analysis spreadsheet. The BTO computer system cannot separate the Whiskered bat and Brandt’s bat, so we may have either or possibly both!

It is exciting that the rare Nathusius' pipistrelle was detected. Our record is not the first one in the North York Moors but there are not very many as can be seen from the NBN (National Biodiversity Network) Atlas. https://species.nbnatlas.org/species/NHMSYS0000080187

The Bat Conservation Trust provides interesting information on Nathusius' pipistrelle and all of the other UK bat species. https://www.bats.org.uk/about-bats/what-are-bats/uk-bats/nathusius-pipistrelle

The National Park will continue acoustic bat surveying this year in the Esk Valley and surrounding area (as part of the REConnect Project https://www.northyorkmoors.org.uk/nature-recovery/riveresk ) . Our Community Earth Project will be participating.

The work will be carried out when bats are active between May and September. The aim will be to conduct a survey in every 1 km grid square. That will need a few seasons. If you are interested in helping by deploying a detector and uploading the data for analysis let us know. We will also welcome offers of hosting a detector in your garden for a week.

03/12/2025

There will be another Community Work Morning this Saturday 6th December, from 10am to 12 am at Bow Bridge Community Meadows (the fields opposite Castleton playground). We will be working on repairing and constructing some dead hedges. You are welcome to call by to help out, or simply say hello!

02/11/2025

Our local repair Upper Esk Valley Repair Cafe is scheduled for Saturday, 15 November 2025 @ 10am, The Ley Hall, Lealholm.

They are suggesting you may have a lamp/light, or winter clothing that needs repairs.

https://www.facebook.com/p/Upper-Esk-Valley-Repair-Cafe-100087147362130/

We are a group of volunteers who help the communtiy repair items for free

28/10/2025

Join us...for our November Community Morning Meetup at Bow Bridge Community Meadow, Castleton on SATURDAY, 1 NOVEMBER from 10am to 12pm.

A few of us will be there doing some dead hedging, mammal tracking, fungi identification, freshwater monitoring (if we get the kits in time)...

But if you don't fancy any of that, BRING a sketch pad, a novel, your camera, any plant, animal or fungi ID guides...or just come for a WANDER and a CHAT.

DRESS warm and snug as autumn is upon us.

Sorry no dogs.

15/10/2025

Here’s a reminder that on Tuesday 21st October, there will be a chance to visit Danby Lodge National Park Centre for a presentation and lighting demonstration from the REConnect team on dark skies and why preserving our night skies matters, not just for stargazing but for the health of our ecosystems and resilience in the face of climate change.

The evening will include a discussion on how local communities can make a difference and a quick update from the Community Earth Project.

Free soup at 6pm! The presentations begin at 6.30.

Booking is essential for catering purposes – you can find the link and book some free tickets here:
https://www.northyorkmoors.org.uk/things-to-do/events/reconnect-events

09/10/2025

On the last Saturday in September, we held our second community work morning at Bow Bridge. At the boundary near the bridge, we continued to build up a very sturdy deadwood fence using wood and dead branches from the Bow Bridge woodland. This will become a tangled maze of habitat for birds and insects,
We also had a go at identifying some of the many autumn fungi which have appeared in the meadow and under the trees. It was difficult and fascinating. There are thousands of species of fungi and to start with we made some guesses based mainly on the size and colour of the caps and their locations. Take a look at our photos and see what you think! Better still, please come along next time and help us try and narrow down the possibilities.
Many thanks to Annie and Finn who joined us and lent their muscle power and expertise. We’re looking forward to seeing you again.
We hope to make these work mornings regular events and warmly invite you to come along to our next one. We’ll post details here soon and if you are already on our mailing list, you’ll get an email invitation too. If you’d like to add your name to our mailing list, please drop us a line at [email protected] . We’ll look forward to meeting more of you soon!

08/10/2025

Dear friends of Community Earth Project,
The Community Earth Project (CEP) Steering Group and the River Esk Connect (REConnect) team of the North York Moors National Park, would like to invite you to a special one-off Dark Skies event at Danby Lodge.

The REConnect project is integrating dark skies into its wider project work, and CEP has supported this by assisting with some bat monitoring at Bow Bridge Community Meadow, Castleton.

Join us on Tuesday, 21 October @ 6pm for soup with our compliments and enjoy some engaging presentations on why dark skies matter.

To book a place, click on this link:
https://www.northyorkmoors.org.uk/things-to-do/events/reconnect-events
We very much look forward to welcoming you.

27/07/2025

Butterfly Conservation’s Big Butterfly Count began on July 15th and will run until August 10th. So far, over a million butterflies have been added to the count nationally. https://bigbutterflycount.butterfly-conservation.org/ has all the details you need, an identification chart and an interactive map where you can add your observations.

How to Take Part:
Download the free app or use the official ID guide. https://bigbutterflycount.butterfly-conservation.org/charts
Choose a spot and count for 15 minutes.
Submit your sightings via the app or website.
Every count matters! Let’s help protect our butterflies and moths — for now and for future generations.

If you would like to count in company, you can go along to Great Ayton on Wednesday July 30th to help Climate Action Stokesley and Villages count butterflies, with the support of Martin Partridge Chair of Yorkshire Branch Butterfly Conservation, as part of the Big Butterfly Count. Recently Martin surveyed the meadow and identified two butterflies that had not been recorded in this area before. Meet at 11 am by the picnic benches in the Floodplain Meadow, if it is not raining. More details here: https://climateactionstokesleyandvillages.org/2025/07/20/big-butterfly-count-in-great-aytons-floodplain-meadow/

And finally, Butterfly Conservation Yorkshire has a splendid guide to the 39 butterfly species Yorkshire supports. You can find that here: https://www.yorkshirebutterflies.org.uk/yorkshire-species?fbclid=IwZXh0bgNhZW0CMTAAYnJpZBEwOFQzM0hMNFh4ckZ1UjBCcQEea_2i2650wacTUUacLKfIx6JdVuR4_S7Sn_KyF660TdbmOF4vKVkHsBjOkF8_aem_JpmU3gl-JVP1UU0FUv5lAA

Let’s put our area on the map and help find out what is happening to butterfly numbers this year after a butterfly emergency was declared in 2024!

21/07/2025

TUESDAY 29th July - 6pm-7.30pm Egton Village Hall
Another chance to learn more about the RIVER ESK CONNECT project!

This should be an fascinating, encouraging event, a chance to connect with like minded people and hear about some practical strategies and ways to get involved. The REConnect Whitby celebration back in June (photos) put us in touch with some wonderful local groups. Looking forward to this next REConnect event on Tuesday 29th July