Welcome to Derbyshire Amphibian and Reptile Group we cover the whole of Derbyshire including part of the Peak District National Park.
Our group aims to promote the study and conservation of the amphibians and reptiles of Derbyshire and their habitats. We achieve this by:
We hope our website will help you to find the information you are looking for, but if you still have a query, please contact us and we will do our best to help.
Derbyshire ARG always welcome new members to the group, please email us on derbyshirearg@gmail.com to join. There is a membership subscription of £5 per year, though that is reviewed at every AGM..
We are very grateful for any records of amphibians and reptiles in your local area that you can pass to us as it helps in mapping the distribution of species and protecting their known habitats. Either contact us directly or use the Record a sighting tab on this website.
The group is run by a committee which is elected at the AGM each year. For 2024 - 2025 the committee elected at the AGM on 13th January 2024 are:
Chair - Kelvin Lawrence, Vice Chair - Christian Murray-Leslie, Secretary - Chris Monk, Treasurer - Jayne Thompson
Committee members - Garry Dorrell, Richard Fenn Griffin, Chris Hallam, James Longley, Sheila Stubbs and Ben Wyke
Kelvin Lawrence is also the Derbyshire Toad Crossings Co-ordinator for the Group & for Froglife
See a previous newsletters here
January_2021_DARG_newsletter_31.pdf
August_2020_DerbyshireARG_newsletter.pdf
February_2020_DARG_Events_newsletter.pdf
DARG_April_2019_newsletter.pdf
DARG_January_2019_newsletter.pdf
Derbyshire ARG data policy
DARG_data_protection_policy_November_2018.pdf
The first results are back from the eDNA water samples taken by the group on the GCN training course day and on the field trip in May.
The water sample from the pond at Hilton Gravel Pits SSSI nature reserve came back negative for great crested newts, so they appear to be avoiding this pond which probably has more fish than the one we saw at the time of sampling.
The village mere pond sampled on the field trip and the restored field dewpond both near Hartington came back as positive for great crested newts.
The results from the pond sampled as part of Freshwater Habitats Trust PondNet project will be know later in the year.
Derbyshire ARG organised a field survey trip at the end of May to carry out water sampling for sending away to test for the presence of great crested newt environmental DNA in water bodies.
The first site in the morning was to carry out the GCN eDNA sampling and pond habitat survey for Freshwater Habitats Trust's PondNet project. The large field pond near Pilsbury in the Peak District was the water body selected by FHT and members completed the survey and took the water samples. The result of the eDNA sampling will be known later in the year.
The group then moved on to sample two other ponds a few miles away to take additional eDNA samples for analysis by ADAS. A village mere restored in the 1980's by the Peak District National Parlk Authority was sampled first and the eDNA result was positive for the presence of great crested newts.
A circular field dewpond near Hartington that was restored in 2012 by the Peak District National Parlk Authority from its previous silted and leaking condition was then visited. The eDNA water sample was positive for the presence of great crested newts, confirming that it was worthwhile to have restored this pond which had no previous amphibian records. Whilst taking the samples frog and toad tadpoles and a female smooth newt were seen meaning that this pond supports 4 amphibian species.
A third eDNA sample taken earlier at one of the ponds on Hilton Gravel Pits SSSI nature reserve for Derbyshire Wildlife Trust returned a negative result for great crested newt presence, which was not surprising as it has a connection to a fishing lake and a fish was seen during the sampling.
After yet another late season, not really starting until the end of March the road patrols have now finished for this year. Seems to have been a definite gradient across the county with patrols in the south of the county mostly having higher numbers this year, those in the central part being down on each of the last two years and those in the northwest having a very poor year.
At 6 of the sites male toads were measured for the ARGUK Toadsize project.
Dates have been fixed for member's spring visits to sites where we have reptile surveys running this year.
At present one survey is running at Hassop in the Peak District National Park in co-operation with the National Park Ranger Service and another is at a Derbyshire Wildlife Trust Nature Reserve near Cromford.
A smaller survey may be added this spring at another site close to Cromford and further dates announced for later in the year.
We will be completing a series of reptile surveys across the summer and early autumn of 2024, open to anybody and no knowledge of reptile surveys is needed.
We have refugia (cover object) surveys out at Hassop near Bakewell, Linacre Reservoirs near Chesterfield and Hardwick Hall near Doe Lea. Hassop has been running for 10 years and is monitoring slow-worms and common lizard. We were asked to help set up refugia surveys at Linacre by Severn Trent Water's Ranger where we have monitored grass snakes and checked on common lizard by visual surveys at a separate location on the site. At Hardwick we have assisted the National Trust Rangers in setting up a refugia survey this year to help assess the grass snake population.
In addition we are carrying out visual transect surveys at the Peak District National Park Authority's North Lees Estate to determine the status of Common Lizard across this large estate. There is a mixture of habitats there including the gritstone edges and dry stone walls, dwarf shrub heath, large areas of bracken domination, acid grassland fields, woodland plantations and some wetland and flushes.
Stanage surveys are planned for 27th July, 9th August, 7th & 14th September and 5th October
Hardwick Hall surveys are planned for 23rd August, 21st September and 4th October
Linacre surveys are planned for 12th July, 30th August and 27th September
Hassop surveys are planned for 20th July, 30th August and 28th September
Book a place on the surveys by emailing the Group at derbyshirearg@gmail.com
Grass snake at Hardwick June 2024
We will be attending again this year for the DaNES Insect Show 2024 at the Brackenhurst Campus of Nottingham Trent University. A large number of natural history & environment conservation societies and organisations have displays at the event and there will be a programme of talks. This is open to the public or anyone with an interest in biodiversity.
Derbyshire ARG will probably be joined by Notts ARG for a joint herpetological stand.
Further details nearer the date.
This year's pond and amphibian event for the public, organised in conjunction with Groundwork will be at the National Forest's Feanedock Wood at Moira.
Further details nearer the time
For Toad Crossings and to contact our Derbyshire Toad Crossings Co-ordinator please email derbyshirearg.toads@gmail.com
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