Memorandum submitted by the Moorland Association
(N21)
INTRODUCTION
The Moorland Association is an association of
the owners and managers of heather moorland in England and Wales.
Its members are responsible for the management of over 700,000
of the estimated 800,000 acres of heather moorland remaining in
England and Wales, and the primary objective of the Association
is to prevent the continuing loss of heather moorland, and to
secure its future.
The enquiry which the Environment Food Rural
Affairs Committee ("the Committee") is holding into
the protection of Sites of Special Scientific Interest, and the
progress made towards achieving Defra's PSA target is of particular
concern to the Moorland Association. The heather moorland habitat
that has been created over the past 150 years by land management
practices designed and implemented to create a habitat suitable
for both grouse and sheep is probably the most important single
type of habitat in England and Wales for nature conservation.
Almost 70% of the land managed by members of the Moorland Association
is designated as Sites of Special Scientific Interest (SSSIs)
and the great majority of that land is further designated as SACs
or SPAs. Conversely the uplands embrace a substantial number of
all feature types found within SSSIs—35% of Habitat Directive
qualifying occurrences of habitats within candidate SACs are in
the uplands.
It follows that the condition of heather moorland
is of particular concern in assessing the UK Government's obligation
under the habitat and species directives. The Moorland Association
and its members are all concerned to ensure that the moorland
areas for which they are stewards are maintained in favourable
condition.
GROUSE MOOR
MANAGERS' CONTRIBUTION
The Committee should understand that the heather
moorland that remains in England and Wales has been preserved
almost entirely by the actions of landowners who have managed
the land primarily for sporting purposes and in particular for
grouse. Until approximately five years ago, substantive areas
of heather moorland were being reduced and/or lost to over-grazing
(which degrades it to little better than unimproved grassland)
and to afforestation. The loss of heather between 1945 and 1995
was between 25% and 40% (depending on the definition of heather
moorland) and it is for practical purposes only where the moorland
owner has had the incentive and the ability to maintain a higher
value from his land than forestry would offer, and to ensure that
over grazing is limited, that heather has survived. It is therefore
no coincidence that the heather moorland areas that are designated
are substantially in the Pennine range of the north of England
and in the North York Moors. It should be noted that in those
few other areas where moorland has been maintained by input of
public finance (rather than by private sporting imperatives) the
range of ground nesting birds is less than on those managed for
grouse—we note from RSPB survey last year that curlews and
green plover are almost extinct on Exmoor, whilst counts of waders
on Dartmoor are a minute fraction of those found on similar land
in North Yorkshire.
ENGLISH NATURE
CONDITION ASSESSMENTS
2001
Given the high proportion of heather moorland
areas designated as SSSI within the past 20 years and given the
emphasis placed on these SSSIs in their selection as habitats
of importance in a European context by designation as candidate
SACs, the Moorland Association was astonished to read "The
State of Nature" report published by English Nature in March
2001. That publication suggested that 72% of upland heathland
SSSIs and 60% of blanket bog were in unfavourable condition. No
reference to the Moorland Association or its members had been
made prior to the publication of The State of Nature, and since
2001 the Moorland Association has been trying to ascertain from
English Nature the basis upon which those judgements were made.
Some explanation has been given, but to date robust scientific
evidence to fully support the very damning overall assessment
has not been forthcoming. That is perhaps not surprising given
the apparent disparity between the decisions that had justified
designating so much land as SSSI (because of its condition and
its scientific importance) and the suggestion soon afterwards
that much of that area was in unfavourable condition. For example,
in discussion we learnt that the entire area of a substantial
English moor was recorded as being in unfavourable condition,
and not improving, because of a temporary, albeit severe, outbreak
of heather beetle, which affected no more than 10% of its total
area. Traditional management techniques, which harnessed natural
processes, all but eliminated the outbreak within three years,
rendering the condition assessment manifestly and scientifically
wrong. It has been examples such as this, which have eroded the
trust of moorland managers in English Nature's ability to make
accurate assessments, and of course those managers have felt aggrieved.
One moment they had been basking in the reflected glory of SSSI
designations, which their management practices had earned, and
the next they were being publicly pilloried for those same practices,
particularly rotational burning, which English Nature now claimed
to have reduced nearly three quarters of their land to unfavourable
condition!
JNCC COMMON
STANDARD MONITORING
CRITERIA
JNCC has now published criteria (the common
standard monitoring criteria) which are intended to operate uniformly
throughout the United Kingdom. It should be noted that in course
of arriving at those criteria, there has been no consultation
with land managers, nor, despite our request for involvement,
has there been any reference to the Moorland Association. It is
clear, however, that the combined JNCC view in respect of burning
for example (possibly influenced in large part by Scottish National
Heritage) has produced assessment criteria that are in marked
contrast to those applied hitherto by English Nature in management
agreements and condition assessments. These required that "all
age classes of Calluna (heather) be present, with at least
25% of the unit in the late mature/degenerate age class or between
10-30% of the unit excluded from any burning rotation". The
JNCC criteria, requiring only that 10% should be left un-burnt,
makes no mention of the alternative of having heather in the late
mature/degenerate age class. We do not believe that a scientific
case has been made for leaving heather unburned, and we will continue
to argue for a properly managed burning rotation, which of course
should leave ample heather in the late mature stage, but the fundamental
point is clear: Knowledge is still developing in the field, and
alterations to existing practices must be based on sound, proven
science, as well as a broad consensus.
The JNCC criteria will now be subject to public
evaluation, and we are working with English Nature in the Burning
Group and through ongoing work on our joint Memorandum of Understanding
(MOU) (both of which will be referred to later), to try and ascertain
the justification for those criteria with which we have difficulty
and their relevance to heather moorland generally. There are a
number which we believe are inappropriate—for example, a
complete ban on burning in bracken stands is, in our view, flawed.
Bracken control work can include selective burning to stimulate
new growth, and hence chemical uptake, when properly coordinated
with Azulox treatment. Notwithstanding the above, the JNCC criteria
are considerably better than previous English Nature proposals—for
example it had hitherto been suggested that a site should be in
unfavourable condition if there was any burning on blanket bog,
which was to be prohibited entirely (There was an added difficulty
in the lack of an agreed definition of blanket bog!). It is now
accepted in the JNCC assessment criteria that burning on active
blanket bog, though in some cases undesirable, can be carried
out selectively if done correctly.
ENGLISH NATURE
CONDITION ASSESSMENTS
2003
The assessments therefore made by English Nature
up to date must be regarded with considerable scepticism, even
though we accept that they have been made in good faith on the
basis of the best available information English Nature had (which
appears to us to be relatively little). In December 2003 English
Nature published its most recent full assessment of the condition
of SSSIs. This appears to show that the position in the uplands
between March 2001 and December 2003 has remained substantially
unchanged, which is perhaps not surprising since English Nature
had not, in the intervening period, apparently changed the basis
upon which it assessed the condition of the sites. It has not
been able to explain to the Moorland Association and its members
the reason for its concern in such a way that has convinced moor
managers to change the management practices that created the sites
in the first place. In view of the fact that the assessments were
published 3 months before JNCC's publication of its criteria,
we can only assume that the assessments were made against the
previous existing criteria, and in particular English Nature's
Upland Management Handbook published in 2001, again without consultation
with moor owners. The basis for the 2003 assessments must therefore
be regarded as unproven, and it is unfortunate that their very
public airing has again pilloried moorland managers for presiding
over what will be seen by many as a 70%+ failure rate!
The two major reasons for the alleged adverse
conditions of moorland sites are overgrazing (which accounts for
some 45% of unfavourable sites) and moor burning (which accounts
for some 26% of such sites).
OVERGRAZING
Subject to the major question of the relative
condition of sites at the date of designation when contrasted
with their condition at the date of assessment (to which we return
later in this paper), the Moorland Association believes that the
question of damage by overgrazing is likely to be correct.
We have already indicated in the opening of
this paper that one of two major cause of loss of heather since
the war has been overgrazing, and even though moorland owners
have done their very best to resist the pressure of overgrazing,
in many cases grazing pressures and the management of sheep lie
outside the owners' control. A large proportion (approximately
25%) of heather moorland comprises common land, where the rights
of the commoner are quite independent of the right of the owner
of the common and are limited only by the numbers registered and
the determination of the owner to enforce those numbers. The old
agricultural subsidy regime, founded on payment per head of sheep,
has in the past given farmers a very considerable incentive to
increase stock numbers to a level far greater than many commons
could sustain. Furthermore, problems arising from over registration,
and separation of rights of common from the land to which they
are appurtenant, means that the owners of commons often have very
limited scope for preventing damage. This is particularly so when
agricultural subsidies enable commoners to bring hay and other
imported feedstuffs onto the common, leading to a concentration
of stock in particular areas and hence localised over grazing
and very often under grazing in other areas. Similar problems
arise when farms have been let on old tenancy agreements without
such stipulations as stock numbers and stock management practices.
Those rights then become protected under the Agricultural Holdings
Act 1948 and 1986 so that again the scope of the owner to limit
damage is restricted. Owners who have been successful in limiting
over grazing have often done so at considerable expense to themselves
by taking every opportunity to buy out rights of common and by
taking land in hand when tenancies become vacant, as the only
practical way to reduce stock numbers. This of course can create
a related sociological problem in reducing farmers in the area,
but it has been necessary to prevent damage caused by the Common
Agricultural Policy.
We believe that the position could have been
considerably mitigated if the Ministry of Agriculture (as it then
was) and now Defra had been prepared to enforce cross compliance
provisions, which could have required that there should be no
localised over grazing and no feeding in such a way as to cause
local tramping, poaching and destruction of heather. Our experience,
and that of a number of Moorland Association members, is that
the powers available were not used at a time when much damage
could have been prevented by use of cross compliance regulations,
not to drive out farmers but simply to limit damage they were
doing by their stock management practices.
We believe that the change in the subsidy regime
from a headage basis to an area basis, whilst still unproven,
will substantially mitigate the damage that has been done and
we hope that a move to area payments will reduce the incentive
to over graze. These changes will take time to remedy the damage
that has been caused by overgrazing over a period of some 40 years
but we anticipate that the great majority of the SSSIs concerns
should be achieving recovery status within the PSA target period.
It is important, however, that the cross compliance provisions
restricting both over grazing and under grazing should be firmly
(if fairly) enforced so that tax payers' money is not wasted.
If support payments have the effect of encouraging graziers to
destroy the habitat, and if this then requires considerable finance
through stewardship schemes to restore it, then the policy will
have been doubly wasteful.
We submit, therefore, that, quite apart from
the private efforts of the landowner (which has been the only
constant throughout), the primary agency with power to reduce
damage from over grazing is likely to be Defra. Other agencies,
however, clearly have an important role to play and in particular
English Nature. Whilst we have concerns about English Nature's
measure of over grazing. There is no doubt that the knowledge
of particular field officers, their ability to work with landowners
and farmers within their area and the availability of funds to
English Nature under Wildlife Enhancement Schemes, have enabled
particular problem areas of over grazing to be tackled and in
particular for sheep numbers to be reduced during the winter months
by off-wintering and winter housing schemes. Such schemes are
particularly difficult to put together and implement where large
areas of land, and in particular where common land, is involved.
The Moorland Association gained considerable experience in initiating
such schemes through the Moorland Management Company's Northland
Upland Moorland Regeneration Project (NUMRP) under Objective 5b.
Although part of the work of the scheme was frustrated because
of the time limits and constraints imposed by foot and mouth,
the role of the scheme facilitators, who were able to give their
time and knowledge to bring together a number of farmers involved
in grazing a particular area, showed the way forward for successful
implementation of such schemes. Unfortunately, imposition of regional
arrangements rather than land type makes projects replicating
NUMRP impracticable, but there is no reason why schemes should
not be devised which draw upon the principles and lessons learnt
which are contained in our report on the Project.
Local Authorities, and in particular National
Parks, also have an important element to play in this work, and
the work of the North York Moors National Park Objective 5b Scheme
(particularly in improving livestock quality through tick control,
bracken spraying and vaccination) has had a marked effect on the
management of grazing in the North York Moors SSSI, with a consequent
improvement of the condition of the moors there. Apart from these
schemes, it seems unlikely that Local Authorities have a great
deal of scope to ensure that PSA targets can be achieved in the
uplands. We have no doubt that further funding and further personnel
would enable the work of English Nature to be accelerated. Reducing
over grazing is time consuming and expensive, and we are not satisfied
from the information we have that English Nature have the resources
to carry out all the work they would like to do. We have in recent
months pointed out a number of areas which are manifestly suffering
from over grazing where action has yet to be taken to resolve
the position—again we believe that use of the powers available
to English Nature, as well as money, would speed up improvements.
BURNING
The second reason for the alleged adverse condition
of upland sites is moor burning. In this respect we are very firmly
of the view that English Nature are substantially mistaken in
their reasoning and in their allegations as to the damage carried
by controlled burning. The areas designated as SSSIs have been
designated because of the management regime effected over a period
of 150 years and that management regime has always included rotational
burning to secure a mosaic of heather of different ages, which
is so beneficial not only to grouse but to the many other species
of ground nesting birds for which it constitutes home. The Tharme
report, commissioned by the RSPB in the North Pennines, indicates
that populations of curlews and lapwings are approximately 5 times
higher on managed grouse moors than on similar unmanaged moorland
and other ground nesting birds, including golden plover, are twice
as abundant. There is no doubt that burning is necessary to provide
the bare ground which golden plover require, while well managed
burning rotations also provide ample long heather for nesting
sites for those birds requiring it, including merlin and other
raptors.
In our joint MOU with English Nature they have
accepted that the onus is upon them to demonstrate scientifically
the justification for any changes they seek to established management
practices, and since 2001 the Moorland Association has been pressing
English Nature to justify its allegations that moors are suffering
by over burning or that damage is being caused. It may be that
one ground for their concern is the suggestion that heather is
being deliberately burnt to limit nesting sites for hen harriers.
Research by RSPB and CEH in Scotland, however, demonstrates that
long heather is not essential for hen harrier breading success,
albeit that (along with many other birds) it may be the nesting
site of choice. Furthermore, in a recent field study with English
Nature on a well burnt moor, we were able to demonstrate the existence
of very considerably more suitable nest sites than would be required
if the bird's numbers increased to levels accepted as being the
recovery target. For these 2 reasons we hope that the aggressive
assertions made on this subject will now die away.
The Moorland Association has established with
English Nature a Burning Group to review the Heather Burning Code
and to establish best burning practice. In that group we have
experts from The Heather Trust, Game Conservancy, National Gamekeepers'
Organisation (Moorland Branch), the National Farmers' Union and
National Sheep Association, and we are just beginning to consider
each issue, or allegation of damage claimed to arise from burning.
This work has been considerably facilitated by a publication commissioned
by English Nature, Report Number 550 entitled "Review of
the impact of heather and grassland burning in the uplands on
soils hydrology and biodiversity". This is a literature review,
which pulls together all the published research on the subject.
However, it must be stressed that a number of the Conclusions
(which are given prominence in the Executive Summary) are unsupported
by the main text of the document and appear instead to be the
personal views of the author or others. We believe that these
may now have been disowned by English Nature in the light of considerable
criticism by senior scientists in a number of fields. That said,
the text of the literature review makes it clear in our view that
there is little scientific evidence, or there is conflicting evidence,
relating to the assertions of damage caused by burning. There
is patently a need for further research, but until it is clear
that there is demonstrable damage caused by burning, then there
seems to be little justification in changing a burning regime
that has created such an important habitat in the first place
and which has maintained it for 150 years.
Similarly, site visits by the burning group
to examine specific problems have indeed highlighted examples
of bad burning practice, and these justify criticism, but English
Nature's suggestions of generalised over burning, or of damage
caused on blanket bog for example by destruction of sphagnum,
where clearly the sphagnum is regenerating and is maintained within
the burning regime, suggest that many of fears of English Nature
are over stated.
This is an issue that must be resolved by good
science and by co-operation between moorland managers and scientists.
It will only be resolved if land managers can be satisfied that
their long-standing management is really causing the sites to
be in unfavourable condition. This is an area where English Nature
must take the lead by working, through the medium of Burning Group,
with land managers and with other scientists involved, to resolve
such issues that now remain. A large number of those issues appear
to be capable of being resolved if JNCC are prepared to adopt
more flexible assessment criteria relating to blanket bog and
dry heath, and we remain hopeful that the issues outstanding can
be resolved by discussion.
Wildfires. The point is of particular
importance given the damage that has been caused in recent years
by wild fires in Sites of Special Scientific Interest, and by
the fact that the risk of such wild fires is likely to be increased
by increased public access under the Countryside & Rights
of Way Act. Two fires in the North York Moors in 2003 demonstrate
the relative risks—a fire on one moor, Bransdale, a managed
grouse moor regularly burned by the keepers, took hold but was
unable to spread because there was no great mass of un-burnt heather
in which the fire could run, and which would enable it to gain
sufficient heat to burn into the peat. By contrast a moor fire
on Fylindales, which ran through un-burnt heather, took approximately
1 week to extinguish and has done such damage by burning into
the peat that it is unlikely that the habitat will ever be capable
of full restoration. Regular burning on moorland by the grouse
moor manager is the best defence against wild fires and the best
way of limiting damage when such fires arise.
In summary, we submit that the current assessment
by English Nature of the condition of English Moorland SSSIs is
likely to be significantly wrong, particularly when it assesses
condition arising from routine burning. We believe that reassessment
on the basis of the revised JNCC criteria will itself produce
a very substantial reduction in the area regarded as being in
unfavourable condition, and this is particularly likely to be
the case when these revised criteria are themselves revised in
the light of discussions with landowners and managers who have
considerable knowledge and experience of the issues and the land
in question.
CHANGE IN
CONDITION SINCE
DESIGNATION
However, the biggest single change is likely
to arise from the clear specification in the JNCC Criteria when
it requires the feature to be assessed against its extent / condition
since SSSI notification.
Paragraph 7 (on page 22) states "the feature
is favourable if there has been no measurable decline in extent
since SSSI notification. This judgement will be dependent on sufficient
data being available to make comparisons. Site management objectives
have a bearing on this as they may specify the expansion of one
feature at the expense of the other". This statement is eminently
logical—if a site has been designated because of its condition
at the time of designation, then it seems unreasonable to complain
that the site has become unfavourable because it has continued
in that condition since designation. For example, in the North
York Moors there are large areas of caluna vulgaris, which
dominate the moorlands to the exclusion of almost all other shrubby
species. That condition has been the case for very many years,
with management practices quite specifically encouraging this
"monoculture" state for very good economic reasons—the
proliferation of grouse. The site was designated when the vegetation
had that monoculture. Yet, if it was not for the provisions of
paragraph 7 to which we have referred, the area would be treated
as being in unfavourable condition because there may not be at
least two shrub species within the specified small sample area
or areas. It appears clear to us that the very great majority
of heather moorland SSSIs have improved since designation, which
in most cases has been within the last 15-20 years. We see no
evidence of deterioration—burning practices have continued
unchanged and grazing pressures have, if anything, been reduced.
We believe that when Moorland SSSI are properly assessed against
this criteria, judgement may be very different.
CONCLUSION
Condition assessment is fundamentally a matter
for English Nature and we submit that the primary responsibility
for determining whether land meets PSA objectives lies with English
Nature. Realistically, however, English Nature will achieve most
if it will continue to work with Landowners (as it traditionally
has done) to achieve such changes as both English Nature and owners
regard as necessary to modify or adapt a regime which has been
established for 150 years, and which has created a type of habitat
of national and international importance, accepted as such by
all conservation agencies and which provides revenue to enable
conservation work throughout the uplands to be carried out. Landowners
will need convincing that it is right to change that management
regime and must be convinced that this is the correct way forward
for them. They do not wish to cause damage to the land for which
they are responsible, but to date they see no evidence to substantiate
the allegation that what they have done is damaging—indeed
every time that suggestion is examined, it is demonstrated to
be unsubstantiated. It is important that bad management is removed.
Mistakes will always happen and casual and wholesale burning is
clearly inappropriate in this fragile ecosystem. However, adjustments
in management practice will only be achieved by co-operation between
English Nature and land managers and that is the biggest contribution
that any Agency can make towards achieving the Government's PSA
target. The Moorland Association is committed to working with
English Nature, though work in bodies such as the Burning Group,
to help achieve targets which are agreed as being realistic.
1 April 2004
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