Snipe, curlew, dragonflies and sphagnum mosses are just some of the species that will benefit from recent restoration work carried out on Bodmin Moor.
A partnership of regional and local organisations including South West Water is using £2m funding from the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs to restore 1,680 hectares of damaged peatland on Bodmin Moor, Dartmoor and Exmoor.
At Park Lake, a former china clay quarry converted to a reservoir on Bodmin Moor close to Colliford, 18 hectares of valley mire have been restored using peat, wood and stone to block drainage ditches. This will enable peat to accumulate again, which in turn will improve water storage, carbon capture and water quality as well as benefiting biodiversity.Morag Angus, South West Water’s Exmoor Mires Partnership Manager explained: ‘We had to bring in an amphibious 16-tonne specialist digger to carry out the work, which took a week. This is the first time the team have used stone in peatland restoration, but the ditches at Park are deep and wide so it works better and we were able to reuse stone from the old clay works.
‘The site is already known for breeding snipe and curlew, but the work will create further suitable habitats not only for these birds but other species such as dragonflies and the all-important peat-forming sphagnum mosses.’