The Game & Wildlife Conservation Trust (GWCT) cannot support the banning of all managed winter burning on all deep peat, and we are disappointed that sweeping regulation rather than site specific collaboration is seen as the way forward. Our Peatland Report 2020, which reviewed the available scientific literature, concluded that there is no consistent evidence of the net benefits of such a ban.
There are a number of areas where licences may allow the use of fire in the future. Such licences should be granted willingly and lessons learned from their use. The importance attributed to using controlled burning in the winter to help prevent damaging summer wildfires is a case in point. Heather moorland is a fire prone ecosystem and we need to heed what is known in other parts of the world when it comes to managing that risk.
We are particularly concerned about the impact on biodiversity. Our research shows that upland waders like curlew and golden plover have a strong preference for short vegetation created by burning, with up to six times as many curlew on area managed with burning. We note the point made about licences being granted for conservation and urge the Secretary of State to make this possible for the only remaining strongholds of these gravely threatened species.
Significant new research is coming out on how managed burning relates to carbon and water storage. Given the significant impacts on carbon budgets, and other public goods such as wildlife, we feel that policy decisions are being made on the basis of incomplete knowledge. It is very important that we evaluate what we will lose if heather burning is reduced. Monitoring needs to reveal if this policy leads to an actual improvement.
The GWCT has embarked on long-term heather burning and cutting trials to complement the one on Natural England’s National Nature Reserve at Moorhouse and further work being done by York University. This work is being done because:
- the evidence on carbon being lost as a result of managed fire is widely challenged. The studies that have been conducted have been over short time scales which don't allow for the carbon sequestered by the vegetation growing back.
- some research suggests managed burning can help enhance carbon storage and biodiversity through the restoration of moss cover and supporting a diversity of rare birds, plants and invertebrates.
- multiple government reviews have found no good evidence that burning and flooding are linked.
- restricting managed fires may increase the risk of wildfires through the removal of firebreaks and increasing the burnable fuel loads.
We very much hope government will get involved in all these trials and ensure the learnings are built into future management policy for the uplands. With so much evidence still being gathered, it is vital that any new regulation includes a mechanism to ensure it evolves to follow the science. Until further work is complete, we believe there should be more willingness to use adaptive management to get to better solutions for the management of deep peat, given all accept there are evidence gaps, especially around understanding the longer term cycles of carbon and peat formation.
Download Peatland Report 2020 >>