329 



YORKSHIRE NATURALISTS AT SETTLE. 



The 274th Meeting of the Yorkshire NaturaHsts' Union was held at Settle 

 on Bank Holiday, August 5th. The Union was joined by members of 

 the British Ecological Society, among whom were the President (Dr. 

 Wm. G. Smith), Mr. A. G. Tansley, F.R.S., the Secretary (Dr. E. J. 

 Salisbury), and a more ambitious programme than usual (under existing 

 conditions) was arranged. The members assembled in goodly numbers 

 at Huddersfield on Thursday, August 1st, when a meeting was held in 

 the evening in the Biological Department of the Technical College, to 

 consider some of the chief geological and vegetation features of the districts 

 to be visited. The following four papers were given, illustrated b}' maps 

 and lantern slides : — Dr. Wm. G. Smith, ' Plant Communities of Hills and 

 Valleys ' ; Dr. T. W. Woodhead, ' Vegetation of the Pennine Moors ' ; 

 Dr. A. Gilligan, ' Geolog}^ and Topography of Ingleborough ' ; and 

 Mr. C. A. Cheetham, ' Vegetation of the Settle and Ingleborough District.' 

 The members found good accommodation at the George Hotel, and early 

 the following morning made an excursion from Marsden to Saddleworth 

 via Wessendcn and Bills o' Jacks, where typical plant associations of the 

 Southern Pennines were seen. The journey was then continued to Settle, 

 which was to be the headquarters for the four following days. Good and 

 reasonable accommodation was provided at the Golden Lion Hotel, and 

 the weather on the whole being very favourable, an interesting and profit- 

 able time was spent. Details of the excursions are given in the following 

 reports. At a meeting held on Monday evening, August 5th, over which 

 Dr. Wm. G. Smith presided, votes of thanks were accorded to Messrs. 

 J. A. Farrah and Alric Watkins for permission to visit Keasden Beck and 

 the moors at Dovenanter ; also to Mr. C. A .Cheetham and the o.^ncers 

 responsible for arranging the details of the excursion. Mr. A. A. Pearson 

 F.L.S., London, was elected a member of the Union. — T.W.W. 



Geology. — Albert Gilligan, D.Sc, F.G.S., reports : — At the pre- 

 liminary meeting held at Huddersfield, the writer gave a short sketch of 

 the geological history and structure of the Pennine Chain, noting especially 

 those features which would be encountered in the field and had a special 

 significance for the ecologists. On the Friday, starting from Huddersfield, 

 which is situated in the Lower Coal Measures, the route up the Wessenden 

 Valley and across the moors to Saddleworth carried us through the whole 

 succession of the Millstone Grit Series to the Yoredales of the Saddleworth 

 Anticline. Fine sections of the Middle Grits were seen in stream sections 

 and road cuttings, and splendid scars and bluffs of the Kinderscout Grit 

 were well exposed above Bills o' Jacks and on the way to Pots and Pans. 

 Attention was paid to the large hog-backed mounds in the Wessenden 

 valley which had been conjectured to be due either to landslips or glacial 

 action, but the better explanation suggested by ob.serving the courses 

 of the present lateral streams was that they were due to these streams 

 changing their courses from time to time, first joining the main stream 

 almost at right angles, and later damming their outlet and flowing parallel 

 to the main stream for some distance before joining it, forming a shallow 

 valley and leaving the mound between the main stream and the lateral. 

 Later the lateral streams may resume their old courses, one such case 

 being very evident. ' Pots and Pans ' is the local name for the curious 

 pot holes in the Kinderscout Grit above Greenfield. These circular de- 

 pressions are similar to those found in the Millstone Grit in many other 

 districts where the resistant beds occur in exposed positions, and have 

 been popularly ascribed to human agency or to the combined action of 

 wind and rain. The large pothole around which the party gathered on 

 an isolated block of grit had all the attributes of those which occur along 

 river courses and formed by running water. Very noticeable was the 

 bilateral symmetry due to the inclination of the axis as in the case of 

 river potholes, and running water seemed the most likely agent to account 



918 Oct. 1. 



