Autumn’s true colours
Red, yellow, purple and gold ... Sue Wilkinson spotlights where to go across our county to see the season in colour.
Nature bursts into life in Yorkshire in autumn with bright berries, shiny conkers, colourful fungi and leaves turning to red, orange and gold.
Migrating birds such as redwing, waxwing and fieldfare can all be seen arriving for the winter.
Here are some of the best places to experience the colours of autumn.
During autumn, Hardcastle Crags are transformed with an explosion of colour.
The trees begin to drop their leaves, carpeting the woodland floor with a sea of greens, oranges, reds and golds, sunlight peeking through bare branches.
Throughout the woodland, and in surrounding hay meadows,
Hardcastle Crags
there’s lots of different types of weird and wonderful colourful fungi to discover too. Thorp Perrow Arboretum
Come and take a stroll in the arboretum.
There you can watch your children let off steam in the adventure playground.
Also enjoy the wonderful bird of prey displays or hand feed the wallabies in the mammal centre.
Thorp Perrow has a lot to offer the whole family.
Keep your eyes peeled for the seasonal trails, family event days, open-air concerts, workshops, lunches and guided tours.
It is the home of one of the UK's finest collections of trees.
These include five National Plant Collections, and leading centre for raptor conservation.
North York Moors
Some of the best places to see purple heather in Yorkshire are National Parks of North York Moors and Yorkshire Dales to moorlands of West Yorkshire and Nidderdale Area of Outstanding beauty.
Fountains Abbey and Studley Royal Water Garden
The evocative ruins of the Cistercian abbey are set beside grounds of Studley Royal medieval deer park in Yorkshire.
It has been declared Yorkshire’s first World Heritage Site.
Studley Royal deer park is a much loved part of the estate. It is home to more than 500 wild red, fallow and sika deer.
The deer park once contained a Tudor manor house known as Studley Royal House.
But this was destroyed by
fire in 1716 and so was rebuilt about 50 years later in the grand Palladian style.
This house too was damaged by fire in 1946. The building was entirely demolished shortly afterwards.
The landscape is peppered with ancient limes, oaks and sweet chestnuts that you can explore via the miles of footpaths and trails that take you into the woodland on High Ride path or down through high-sided Seven Bridges Valley.
Home to more than 80 contemporary sculptures set within 45 acres of woodland gardens, the award-winning Himalayan Gardens are the perfect place to witness the arrival of autumn.
The valley has scenic woodland walks, pagoda, Himalayan shelter and arboretum,
Ripon Himalayan Gardens
three lakes, contemplation circle and Norse hut.
It is widely considered to have the largest collection of rhododendrons, azaleas and magnolias in Yorkshire and children will love exploring the gardens, the 20th century thatched summerhouse and the distinctive red Pagoda, built in Bali and overlooking one of the lakes, home to a floating magnolia sculpture.
With more than 300 different types of trees, the arboretum covers 12 acres and includes 52 varieties of oak, 25 limes, 20 birches, 17 acers and some more unusual species such as chitalpa, hybrid of the cigar tree and desert willow, and Broussonetia paper mulberry.
There is also an oak that is directly descended from the King Alfred’s Oak at Blenheim Palace, which is more than
1,000 years old.
Castle Howard Yorkshire Arboretum
The Yorkshire Arboretum, a 120-acre woodland landscape on Castle Howard estate, is home to a collection of more than 6,000 trees from around the world.
Created thanks to the enthusiasm of Lord Howard and James Russell over a period of 18 years between 1975 and 1992, the arboretum site was formerly parkland around Castle Howard, original bastion wall still forming much of the arboretum’s southern boundary.
There are also a number of mature, statuesque parkland trees, especially oaks and sweet chestnuts, dating from the 1780s.
Friendly expert guides are often on hand to explain the collection to visitors.