The fells and valleys of Upper Wharfedale are overflowing with delights from which, once under their spell, very few can escape.
Upper Wharfedale Field Society works to increase the enjoyment derived from the area by deepening and widening understanding of its many and various elements.
Open any of the pages of this site and see what we do.
Meet us and experience it for yourself. You are very welcome to our talks or to join us.
Latest News & Articles
Ornithology Group Visit to Staveley. 18th September 2025
Ornithology Group Visit to Staveley. 18th September 2025
Local History Group Visit to Farfield and High Mill, Addingham. 28th August 2025
Farfield and High Mill, Addingham. 28th August 2025
Ornithology Group Visit to Hest Bank & Warton Sands. 21st August 2025
Ornithology Group Visit to Hest Bank. 21st August 2025
Latest News & Articles
The Upper Wharfedale Field Society is constantly working hard behind the scenes. See what is happening here.
Ornithology Group Visit to North Cave Wetlands. 16 October 2025
Ornithology Group Visit to North Cave Wetlands.
Special Interest Groups
The Upper Wharfedale Field Society covers a wide range of special interest groups.
LOCAL HISTORY & VERNACULAR BUILDINGS
In the Yorkshire Dales, local history and its vernacular buildings are inextricably linked. We have especial interest in all local history, through all aspects of industry including farming, social history from peasant to aristocrat, early trading, tracks and coach routes.
GEOLOGY
The earth formations and movements of the past have created an area of outstanding natural beauty. The most recent apparent dominant force is glaciation which has created the landscape which we see today, in particular the Upper Wharfedale Valley, but there is much more to the valleys, hills and rocks of the Yorkshire Dales.
BOTANY
The Botany Group holds its meetings every other Tuesday from end of April to mid August usually for the whole day. The meetings vary from those sites very close to Grassington eg Kilnsey park, the banks of the Wharfe, to further afield e.g. the west coast for dune systems, reserves in Cumbria and our National Natures Reserves as around Ingleborough. In this way we can become familiar with plants that are not on our doorstep and sites away from limestone grassland.
ARCHAEOLOGY
There are a considerable number of archaeological sites in Upper Wharfedale and Archaeology is regularly represented the Society’s talks programme . In recent years we have had guest speakers from Bradford University and York Archaeological Trust as well as presentations on field work being carried out locally in Wharfedale, Nidderdale and Ingleborough.
“The fells and valleys of Upper Wharfedale are overflowing with delights from which, once under their spell, very few can escape.”
Upper Wharfedale Field Society
Events & Talks
Here’s what is coming up soon.
Grass Wood is the local Yorkshire Wildlife Trust nature reserve. It is a Site of Special Scientific Interest (a SSSI) due the importance of its botany and of considerable natural history interest. Grass Wood also contains a rich range and large number of items of archaeological interest reflecting a probable 2000 years of human activity. These are of intrinsic interest, documenting a long period of social change and include two Scheduled Ancient Monuments (SAMs). Collectively, these archaeological remains form a real management challenge. This talk will review archaeology within Grass Wood – who found it, what they found, and what they made of it. It will conclude by looking at the results of two recent professional surveys of the SAMs.
The upland landscape around Ingleborough contains a classic example of a Karst landscape, and one of the UK’s largest and most famous cave resources. Over the past 60 years cavers have reported large numbers of archaeological finds from these caves, ranging in date from the Upper Palaeolithic to the Early Medieval period. The finds include human and animal remains, lithics, pottery and metalwork. The caves, and the landscape they sit in, are of very high archaeological and palaeoenvironmental significance and are the focus of the ‘Overground-Underground’ project. This is funded by the Foundation for Common Land as part of its ‘Our Common Cause’ project. This year on the project we have assessed human and animal remains from cave sites within the study area and carried out new radiocarbon and stable isotope analysis on 30 samples from 12 of these sites. Results of these analyses, alongside previously published data, allow more detailed understandings of cave use and the wider environment in prehistory.
Contact Us
If you have any questions for the Upper Wharfedale Field Society, or you just want to get on touch, please contact us below.