After a lot of work and prep we can finally advise that Tophill Low Nature Reserve will be re-opening on Monday the 20th July after being closed since the 05th of December.
We're happy that we now have systems in place to conrol the risk from ongoing flood works (which will continue into September) and have a number of new visitor systems in place for COVID19 risk.
Whilst the flood alleviation work continues, the sheet piling operations critical to safeguarding the site from flooding are now complete. However HGV's continue to use 'D res straight' all summer so this will be off limits to all presently.
Hides will all be open with seating, but all shutters and doors will be secured open for the foresseable future so bring your thermals. Our aim is to minimise handling of catches, handles and locks. This goes too for the Izzard photography hide which was members only last season; as keycodes etc are an unwarranted risk presently. So please factor this if you are renewing membership on the assumption of exclusive use of such.
That said normal members only out of hours remains for 6pm - 9am outside of standard times. Sanitising is provided close to the gate for handling member combinations.
Membership is a little complex this year as we have a discounted rate based on the waning year and reduced facilties, plus seperate discount for renewing members that lost out on closure last season to April. For full details please see the membership page for the form here.
We would encourage postal renewals where possible and we can start processing these from now. For those without a printer forms will be available at the gates from tomorrow. Unfortunately we are still not in a position to take electronic payments presently.
As per the wider world we cannot enforce or police the behaviour of social distancing in all cases and the emphasis is very much on the visitor to make their own call on whether they wish to use the facilities present. So please bear in mind reserve staff and volunteers will not be interjecting to constantly distance people in hides which may get busy. If visitors cannot respect social distancing we may be forced to close problem hotspots so please be courteous and respectful in usage. Where touching is unavoidable we have sanitising stations for areas like ticket machines and toilet doors. Please note that our catering station we had prior to closure will no longer be available.
In coming days we have a video coming on the new one way routes we have had to action where we cannot socially distance people, so expect changes to normal visitor flow and adhere to them
Our Yorkshire Water education team have developed an opportunity for family nature workshops running all this summer that can be booked in advance for home-educators here. The team explains more below:
As you can hear - yes the marsh frogs are waiting to welcome you all back!
So we have a week of prep to get sightlines etc ready for wading birds which are already returning. A full update will follow on some of the wildlife we had in the first half of 2020 - I'm afraid these guys were nesting outside McBean hide again like 2018 with no one to show off to but us:
