THE link between sustainable land management practices and biodiversity is critical to the Yorkshire Dales writes Mark Corner, a vice president of environmental campaigning charity, Gargrave based Friends of the Dales.

 

CONNECTING with nature is the basis for my most memorable and uplifting experiences when out in the Dales.

Seeing the first salmon of the season leaping up Stainforth Force, wandering through Muker’s hay meadows or Wharfe Wood’s bluebells, observing the red squirrels at Snaizeholme or the stooping peregrines at Malham Cove, hearing the call of the curlew or indeed the wren currently nesting by our back door: these all bring happiness.

And, of course, nature is our life support system, providing us with our air, water and food and underpinning our economy and society.

We are blessed that the Yorkshire Dales National Park, together with the North Pennines National Landscape, contain the most coherent and connected ecological network left in England.

A quarter of the national park is designated as nationally or internationally important for wildlife and is home to almost 400 nationally important species.

It seems obvious that nature needs to be cherished and protected but the sad reality is that it is in decline. The UK has the twelfth worst ecological intactness rating out of 240 countries and nearly one in six species in Great Britain are now threatened with extinction.

As someone said, nature is amazing and it’s everywhere…until it’s not. Biodiversity in the national park is in somewhat better health than in many other parts of the country but is also in decline.

Only 19 per cent of priority habitats outside of Sites of Special Scientific Interest are in good condition - a fall from 22 percent in 2016.

Inside SSSIs the number is little better at 29 percent. There has also been a reduction in the number of priority species that have stable or increasing populations, down from 81percent in 2016 to 76percent.

A particular blight is the continuing illegal persecution of birds of prey.

As a protected landscape, the Dales could, and should, be an exemplar of how thriving nature and profitable land management can go hand in hand. Although we have some excellent examples of this happening today, there is so much more that we could be doing for wildlife, by enabling a better functioning network of habitats and improving populations of key species, whilst supporting farmers to deliver this.

In April the Campaign for National Parks published a health check that highlighted the importance of nature recovery. This stressed the challenges that national parks face in terms of a lack of data (on species and habitat conditions), powers and resources to make the systemic change needed. It also noted that surveys show that the public want far more priority to be given to nature in national parks.

There is now an opportunity to re-assess nature recovery and the linked climate crisis in the preparation of the 2025 National Park Management Plan. This is the most important document for the Yorkshire Dales National Park.

It is a five-year work programme, produced and monitored by a partnership of local organisations including farming, landowning and tourism business interests. A partnership approach is critical, given that over 95 percent of the land in the national park is in private ownership and agencies such as Natural England and the Forestry Commission regulate and deliver many elements of the plan.

In January YDNPA launched a consultation in which members of the public were asked to rank their top six priorities for organisations working in the national park.

Over 1,000 individuals and 27 organisations, including Friends of the Dales, completed an online survey.

Of 18 potential priorities, ‘help nature to recover by creating, restoring and connecting important habitats’ was ranked first by all groups of respondents. Protecting rare and threatened species came second, with improving river water quality third.

This is, I think, very heartening and will ensure that nature recovery is at the forefront of delivery plans that will be detailed in the final management plan scheduled for publication in March 2025.

A very important input to the management plan will be the nature recovery plan for the Yorkshire Dales National Park, published in December 2023. This adopts the principle of creating and sustaining more, bigger, better and more joined-up wildlife habitats and has the ambition that by 2040 the national park will be home to the finest variety of wildlife in England.

It has been prepared by the Yorkshire Dales Biodiversity Forum, on which Friends of the Dales is represented, and endorsed and published by the Yorkshire Dales National Park Authority.

The main approaches identified in the plan are associated with grazing management, scrub and woodland creation and management, peat restoration and meadow creation and enhancement. It also outlines a proposed means of managing species conservation.

A key issue will be the pace and scale of the move to lower-input farming systems, which has already started and is the single most effective means of delivering the changes needed. Successful delivery of the plan depends upon supportive and aligned government and other funding, particularly the Environmental Land Management schemes. And it depends upon creating conditions where farmers and landowners can see benefits from adapting practices and testing new approaches, particularly regarding grazing and moorland management.

Although the delivery of nature recovery will depend heavily upon government policy we can all contribute by taking actions such as leaving space for nature in our gardens, installing swift boxes and supporting organisations involved in championing nature such as Friends of the Dales.

* This article first appeared in the Yorkshire Dales Society summer review and is reproduced thanks to Friends of the Dales. https://friendsofthedales.org.uk/