The Yorkshire Film Archive collects, preserves, and shows film made in, or about Yorkshire. Our collections are non-fiction, dating from the 1890s to the present day, and providing a rich and visually compelling record of all aspects of lives, cultures, landscape, industries, major events and everyday activities, many of which are available to watch, free of charge, on our website.
This film is part of Free
From the Ashes
The closing of industrial factories in Sheffield invites wildlife to blossom and thrive once more.
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Overview
All kinds of wildlife forge an existence on land once occupied by Sheffield’s industrial buildings. Michael Clegg explores the lower part of the Don Valley and finds signs of amphibians, rodents, and birds that had all but disappeared from the polluted area. The film also takes care to outline the plans to create a nature reserve on the site that would further encourage wildlife to thrive there.
Michael Clegg was a well-known Yorkshire-born naturalist. He was a columnist for the Yorkshire Evening Post, a regular guest on BBC Radio 4’s Natural History program, and presented the Yorkshire Television series Clegg’s People throughout the 1980s. Clegg was an avid wildlife campaigner and had a wildflower and hay meadow posthumously named after him in 2004.
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