Moorgate Cemetery
Owner: Rotheram Borough Council
Managed with Friends of Moorgate C emetery with Boston Park
Site Details
Walker: Steve Branch Distance 1209m Altitude 100m Walk time: 35mins
Dating back to victorian times the cemetary with mature tree lined avenues and blocks of graves with neatly cut grass cut has many wilder thickets of Bramble, Holly and Ivy and is a haven for woodland butterflies
Sections
S1 From the entrance past mature trees towards SW corner and large areas of graves where Dog Violet is often the dominant species and the stone walls covered with Ivy is largely a sunny area and well sheltered
S2 Entrance to a large open parkland area with specimen trees turn and head east in the shadow of mature trees. Good numbers of Speckled wood and teh most Holly Blue are seen here
S3 A meandering walk underneath trees but with small open sunny areas with some scrub towards the Chapel contains a good variety of grassalnd species and Speckled woods are at their most common
S4 Loops around a more planted area and a block of Buddleia bushes passes north of the chappel and then in shadow under soem mature Beech heading toowards the path with violets present where shade is not too heavy .
S5 From the path head back under the trees towards the northern boundary path and then east to the northern corner
S6 heading south in shade of mature trees on teh eastern boundary towards a clearing, circle the clearing around scrubby patch heading south
S7 head south down the eastern boundary and around the wide loop back towards the chapel
S8 From the Chapel returning to teh entrance
2023 Results
County wide 2023 results reflect the 2022 Heat and drought with Small Tortoiseshell and Peacock nearly halved for the second year against their 5 year average. Red Admiral arrived in force in July and took advantage of soft nettle growth of the rains and had their best year ever. Drought sensitive species on thin soils were badly hit, particularly Dark -green Fritillary and Northern Brown Argus but also Ringlet, Green-viened White and Small Heath. Less drought affected species along with the hottest June on record built even more on gains last year leading to Comma, Brimstone, Holly Blue and most Browns having a fantastic year reaching all time highs. A increase of 9% overall was mostly due to sheer numbers of Meadow Browns and Gatekeepers ment 2023 nearly pipped 2014 as best year in modern times. Most noticeable was the large differeces between moisiture retaining mineral soils of the valleys and thin, dry limestone or sandy soils. A large number of damp grassland, hedgerow and woodland dominated sites benefitted hugely with 3 sites seeing more than 50% increase . A smaller number of thin, chalky, sandy or craggy sites did badly some down up to 25%.
