12 August 2025
Moorland in crisis: Why our Heather Uplands need urgent protection
As the Glorious Twelfth marks the traditional start of the grouse season, attention once again turns to our upland landscapes - vast, beautiful, and often misunderstood. These heather-covered moors are more than just a seasonal backdrop, they’re a vital part of the UK’s natural and cultural heritage. But startling new research from The Heather Trust reveals that we may be losing them at an alarming rate.
Moorland the Size of Birmingham Lost Each Year
The Heather Trust’s new study, Heather Futures, has uncovered that the UK is losing heather moorland at a rate equivalent to the size of the city of Birmingham every single year. That’s hundreds of acres of irreplaceable habitat disappearing, taking with it the biodiversity, climate benefits, and livelihoods that depend on these landscapes.
Despite long-standing concerns about habitat loss in our uplands, this is the first time the scale of the decline has been quantified. The research brings together the best available data to provide robust, evidence-based insight into how much moorland we’ve lost and why.
Heather moorlands are not just visually iconic; they’re internationally important ecosystems. They support a rich variety of species, including curlew, lapwing, golden plover, and black grouse, many of which are in steep decline. They also deliver critical public goods: clean water, carbon storage, flood prevention, and spaces that boost our mental and physical well-being.
Yet, as our Heather Futures report shows, these habitats are under increasing pressure from:
Commercial afforestation and woodland expansion
Overgrazing or abandonment
Land-use changes driven by policy and climate pressures
Between 1990 and 2023 alone, more than 8,000 km² of moorland has been lost across the UK, with coniferous plantations and improved grassland taking over much of the terrain. And the real figure may be even higher, due to the limitations of how new woodland is recorded in satellite data.
A Call for Smarter, Balanced Land Use
The Heather Trust’s mission is to promote sustainable, resilient moorland for the benefit of everyone, not just those who live and work in the uplands, but society as a whole. They hope that Heather Futures will support policymakers and land managers in striking the right balance: protecting these open landscapes while delivering on broader environmental ambitions.
Ecologist David Jarrett, who led the project, reminds us of what’s at stake:
“Our upland habitats are undergoing rapid change. While there are positives to this, we mustn’t lose sight of the impact on our most cherished upland species. With effective predator control and sustainable management, moorlands can continue to provide refuge for biodiversity and benefits for all.”
Notes to Editors:
KEY FINDINGS
Estimated total losses of moorland between 1990 and 2023 were 609 km² in England, 6,696 km² in Scotland, 349km² in Wales, and 498 km² in Northern Ireland. This represents 21% (Northern Ireland), 15% (Scotland), 7% (Wales) and 7% (England) of the extent of moorland lost over 33 years. Across the UK, this equates to an area of moorland the size of Birmingham being lost each year.
Moorland was primarily converted to improved grassland (55%), coniferous woodland (34%) and broadleaved woodland (6%), though there was significant regional variation with coniferous woodland a more significant threat than improved grassland in many regions of Scotland.
Current targets for woodland expansion across the UK are 30,000 Ha per year, and annual planting rates are currently much lower than this. 88% of new coniferous planting (1990 – 2023) took place on moorland habitats, so there is likely to be significant further pressure on moorland habitat from continued expansion of coniferous woodland.
Data Limitations - Where land transitions from moorland to woodland, either as a result of planting or natural regeneration, sites will still be classified as moorland in the dataset for some years as the trees establish, because in terms of the automatic classification of satellite images, a site will retain most of the characteristics of moorland as young trees establish, even though habitat transition to woodland is underway. Of woodland grants approved from 2015 onwards (including conifers, native, and natural regeneration) only a very small proportion are classed as woodland in the 2023 landcover dataset. While these areas retain many of the characteristics of moorland habitat, the site has de facto been lost as an open moorland habitat. This means that more recent tree planting is excluded from the data, and in the case where tree planting rates have been increasing in recent years (as is the case in most of the UK), the pace of land use change (from moorland to forestry) is likely to be significantly under-estimated.
IMPLICATIONS
Current land use policies have resulted in the loss and fragmentation of open moorland habitats with limited large-scale spatial strategy, and in many cases this has resulted in the creation of unconnected blocks of woodland which have detrimental effects on open ground species and offer limited positive biodiversity value.
Many red-listed open-ground bird species of conservation importance are in rapid decline as habitat is fragmented and managed moorland and the extent of effective predator control declines. In the last 30 years we have observed severe declines of open-ground species and species that benefit from moorland management such as Eurasian Curlew Numenius Arquata, Northern Lapwing Vanellus vanellus, Golden Plover Pluvialis apricaria, and Black Grouse Lyrurus tetrix.
To maintain the benefits of moorland habitats, there is an urgent need to move towards more coherent, integrated, spatially targeted policies in the uplands that balance the benefits of maintaining large areas of contiguous, open moorland habitat with the important benefits associated with the restoration of large-scale native woodlands.
Access the digital report here: fdc287_f70f56c01c0b4d9fbcc52ab65cd74057.pdf
To request a printed copy, please email: info@heathertrust.co.uk
ENDS