Maze Park TVWT
Thornaby Middlesborough
Site Description
Recorders: G avin Struthers Altitude 7m. Distance 1800m Walk Time Approx : 1 hour
Maze Park is a 42-acre urban nature reserve in Middlesbrough on the south bank of the Tees on part of the former Tees Marshalling Yard. It was created by the Teesside Development Corporation and is owned and run by the Tees Valley Wildlife Trust. Much of the site has been planted with a variety of broad-leaved trees and there are some lovely wildflower meadows to attract pollinators such as the regionally scarce grayling butterfly . There are several large landscaped mounds composed of Steelworks slag lime rich and very low in nutrients and similar to dry chalk grassland or sand dune and copntain and abundance of herb species including Birds foot trefoil plus areas of bare ground to encourage both Grayling and Dingy Skipper
Sections:
S1 starts from the Tees barrage where essex Skipper are in some quantity and occasioanl Wall and other grassland species.
S2 enters woodland glade with lareg numbers of Speckled Wood, Orange Tip and White-letter hairstreak are seen.
S3 has teh highest counts on the path southwards to teh railway with large quantitie of Birds foot trefoil and has good numbers of Common Blue and dingy Skipper, Smal Skipper but also Peacock, Comma, Red Admiral and Green viened white and Brimstone bordering the wood.
S4 goes up the mound onto te plateau
S5 circles teh south side of teh mound and more Dingy Skipper.
S6 circles the north side of teh mound where more trees brings more Speckled Wood
S7 Smal heath appears amongst teh grassaland species and BY S8 Wall brown appear in number and Grayling
S10 at thefar east end again has large numbers of Dingy Skipper and COmmon Blue but alos Speckled wood along teh shady hedgerows
Results 2022
A better year and close to teh very good year everywhere of 2019. Small and Dingy Skipper had poorer years ands so did most of the Whites which was teh Yorkshire trend. Also In line with elsewhere Orange Tip was up . Holly blue appeared for the first time and has had a cracking year in Yorkshire and dispersed. Comma also had a boom year unlike its other vanessid cousins who suffered in the heat and drought. Speckled wood were up which was almost universal across sites this year and Wall also had a good year in most places and spread to new sites. Grayling also showed an healthy increase. The other Browns were close to average
Results 2021
2021 was a good year almost as good as 2019. Biggest gainers Wall and Small Heath which is similar to other transects in Yorkshire Small Skippers, Speckled Wood and Common Blue were up which contrasts to down on most transects. Red Admiral, Peacock and Grayling were down . Orange Tip and Brimstone were up similar to most transects.