Heather in the Peak District
Kinder Scout, Edale
In the north of England, lies the first national park the country established. The Peak District is comprised of rolling hills and valleys with diverse moorland species inhabiting them. One of the more important species of plant which blankets the northern facing hills and moors is heather. Calluna vulgaris (heather), is an evergreen shrub which grows close to the ground. In August, it produces purple-pink honey-scented flowers which provides a “late-summer source of nectar for bees.” (Morland Species, peakdistrict.gov.uk). Not only is heather important to the ecosystem, the shrub is important to people. People depend on heather to prevent floods and peat runoff entering reservoirs. Heather is used for revegetating areas of peat that have become baron due to acid rain. And heather provides food for ground nesting fowl such as red grouse (Lagopus lagopus scotica), which people hunt for food and sport.
I was interested in the relationships heather has to people, place, and animals in the Peak District, so I decided to spend some time with the shrub to try to get to know it. It should first be understood that plants are not merely objects, rather they are organisms which are engaged in intricate relationships and living processes. This can be compared to Holdrege’s argument that substances (anything from vitamins to alkaloids) “are not things but rather part of specific processes.” (Holdrege, 2013:102). He states that plants are not static objects, yet part of a lifeforce energy that grows, changes, reproduces, and dies; “The plant maintains –or continuously generates—a stream of life of development and transformation. Out of this stream it brings forth its different forms and functions.” (Holdrege, 2013:100).
With this ideology in mind, I hiked up the steep hill in Bamford to reach the moorland past Bamford Edge. I walked until I found some sheep grazing on patches of grass between the heather. I chose what seemed to be a nicely groomed patch of heather and sat down to spend time with it; to try and understand it. I found it a little hard to focus at first as around me there was a busy soundscape. Birds were chirping, the distinct call of the red grouse was taunting (so close yet too far away to snap a picture), bees were buzzing, and in the distance, sheep were chatting. What I had experienced was what John Hartigan defines as “the social.” Even in the vastness that is the moorland, there are social interactions happening among diverse species. As an anthropologist, Hartigan (along with myself) find that “this is the first time I consider the socialas a distraction rather than as that which I painstakingly work to see and explain.” (Hartigan, 2018:260).
Kinder Scout, Edale
I clear my head and start to draw the handsome shrub in front of me. In-between pencil strokes, I study the parts of the plant and describe what I see from top to bottom and its environment:
It’s early May in the Peak District. Blanketing the moors is the plant, heather. The rust brown shrub surrounds you, surprising you with splashes of a faint purple that is to bloom in late summer. Up close, you first notice the dead light brown tips which tower over the rest of the plant. These are adorned with tiny white dead flowers and speckles of new red shoots of the pine like leaves. Moving down the reddish-brown woody stem you find healthy green little leaves. At the base of the plant the stems and roots intertwine with the ground moss which seems to make an excellent water retention system. Littered at the base are thousands of tiny dead spherical flowers which I suppose fertilize the soil. This section of the plant is very moist. The roots are tiny white hair-like structures which aren’t too big. The shrubby plant has no noticeable smell when crushed at this time of year. It is surrounded by a wide variety of ground mosses, reed type plants which are currently fashioning dead tops with green bases; they are more sporadic among the heather. Sheep graze and nap in the distance and grouse can be heard all around; startling and flying off cussing if you get within ten yards of one.
The exercise allowed me to observe the tiny details which make up heather plants. The drawing I made forced me to analyze each individual shape and assess each color. Heather has such a calm energy, which arguably I would not have fully understood had I not drawn it. The botanist Francis Hallé reminds us that botanical drawings serve a better purpose than photographs for learning about plants: “It is as if we were visiting a distant planet and encountered a form of extraterrestrial life with which we share no language—a form of life based upon principles that are not our own. If we wish to understand this creature, it is best not to rush.” (Mathews, 2023:43). That being said, the use of macro photography also helped me hone in on the little details.
I spoke with the receptionist at the Moorland Center in Edale about the importance of heather for the Peaks and the park’s surrounding communities. He said that heather was important to protect against erosion. When he was working in the field for the volunteer moor restoration group, Moors for the Future Partnership, the group was cutting heather and transporting it via helicopter to areas where there was bare peat. He enthusiastically showed me a before and after photo of how peat bogs were revegetated with heather. “That [heather] would protect the peat from erosion, but it also contained seeds, and then they would also [put] lime and seed, and fertilizer from there.” He goes on to say that huge barren peat patches were caused by acid rain (the Peak District sits in-between two historically important industrial cities: Manchester and Sheffield).
Interestingly, my new Moorland Center friend went on to say that the moors were a manmade habitat. “You know at one time, the moors would have had a far greater variety of vegetation and probably at one time as well the tree level would have been much higher. So, the heather moors have been brought about largely by management for sporting interests.” The primary sporting interest he is referring to is grouse hunting. “Heather is important for ground nesting birds, which would include things that are relatively rare like curlew. But the reason it’s managed is for grouse. And that would have been done for several centuries now.” Heather is important for grouse as the older plants provide cover for nesting while the younger shoots provide food. So, there is this need for both young and old patches of heather in the moorlands.
Traditionally, this equilibrium of young and old heather has been achieved by muriburn, commonly known as heather burning, and can be traced back to at least the 1800s (Daplyn, Ewald, 2005:18). Keepering of moors is generally done to make sure there are sufficient numbers of grouse. Gamekeepers (keepers) maintain the land by asserting predator control (the hunting of foxes, carrion crows, stoats, and weasels; some illegally hunt raptors which are protected), habitat management, and rotational heather burning (Daplyn & Ewald, 2005:14). The Moorland Center receptionist said “So you will see, to be fair, if it’s controlled, its fine you know because as we may know, other countries do [controlled] burns and the plants will regenerate if it’s done properly. If the fire is too intense, and this is what you worry about when you get fire started by barbecues deliberately, then it will not only burn heather, but it will also destroy the peat as well.”
Controlled heather burning, Bamford
Aerial shots taken during burning season, October – April 2023
In recent years heather burning has become a controversial practice due to its possible destruction of blanket bogs (areas of moorland that contain deep levels of peat). When burning happens on deep peat bogs, the water quality fails, biodiversity falls, peat formation is hindered, and the release of carbon is emitted into the air (peakdistrict.gov.uk). Moorlands containing peat are carbon sinks. “Peatlands store around 30% of the world’s soil carbon, with UK moorlands alone storing about 3,000 megatonnes. 13% of the world’s blanket bog is found in the UK.” (Heather Burning, gwct.org.uk). Although the Peak District is a national park and has not done muriburn for years now, the National Park Authority only owns 5% of the land, meaning it has no authority over the rest of the moors. This means it is up to the numerous estates which own the land to decide whether to do muriburn or not (Moorland Burning, peakdistrict.gov.uk). The alternative to muriburn is heather cutting which achieves the same endpoints as heather burning. However, repurposing the bales from heather cutting has the added benefit of being used for blanket bog restoration in the form of heather bale dams. (Moors for the Future, heather cutting). These dams are “good for slowing the flow of water, trapping sediment, and creating shallow habitat pools” (Moors for the Future, Heather Bale Dam).
Heather has many intricate social interactions with the ground mosses, ground nesting birds, sheep, and the human tourists who come and see the shrub bloom. They have had a significant centuries long relationship with gamekeepers who manage the land specifically for grouse hunting and sport. As Hartigan says, “It seems to me that multispecies ethnography fundamentally must narrate life – that is, describe and analyze life forms in their social relations.” (Hartigan, 2018:253). I traveled to the Peaks to investigate exactly this, the relationship that heather has with people and plants. Although much more scholarship needs to be drawn from this study (but isn’t in the interest of time), I present a snapshot through research and multimedia to help give insight in the moor’s plant species subjectivity, moorland management, hunting, and organism relationships.
Clear division between burned heather and non-burned heather.
Soundscape of heather moorland in Bamford, Peak District
Research, Photography, Audio Recording done by Gabriel Cowan
Works Cited
Bubandt, Nils, et al. Rubber Boots Methods for the Anthropocene Doing Fieldwork in Multispecies Worlds. University of Minnesota Press, 2023.
Daplyn, James, and Julie Ewald. Birds, Burning and Grouse Moor Management A Report on Behalf of the Moors for the Future Partnership, 2005.
“FAQs - Moorland Burning.” Peak District National Park, www.peakdistrict.gov.uk/visiting/frequently-asked-questions/faqs-moorland-burning. Accessed 10 May 2023.
Hartigan, John. “How to Interview a Plant.” Care of the Species, 2018, https://doi.org/10.5749/minnesota/9780816685301.003.0010.
“Heather Bale Dams Factsheet.”
Heather Burning - Game and Wildlife Conservation Trust, www.gwct.org.uk/policy/briefings/driven-grouse-shooting/heather-burning/. Accessed 10 May 2023.
“Heather Cutting Factsheet.”
Holdrege, Craig. Thinking like a Plant: A Living Science for Life. Lindisfarne Books, 2013.
“Moorland Species.” Peak District National Park, www.peakdistrict.gov.uk/looking-after/biodiversity/biodiversity-action-plan/peak-district-species/moorland-species. Accessed 10 May 2023.