Thousands of holes are appearing in the Pennine hills, as part of efforts to by restoring damaged peatland.
Peat itself is carbon rich and so as it grows it will help to capture the CO鈧� that is produced by that is .
Meanwhile, damaged or turn into a carbon source, releasing greenhouses gases themselves. About 15% of the world鈥檚 peatlands have been drained, making these kind of restoration projects essential.
But now a new project is attempting to bring these wetlands back to life. On Holcombe Moor in the West Pennines, , with a further 700 in 2024 as part of Natural England鈥檚 Nature for Climate Peatland Grant Scheme. Improvements are already starting to be seen.
What鈥檚 the history here?
The hills of the West Pennines are no stranger to holes, with a long history of lead and coal mining stretching back to the .
Coal fired the mills nearby during the industrial revolution in cities such as 91直播, Leeds and Sheffield. Smoke drifted back to the hills, carrying the heavy metal impurities of lead and arsenic from coal burning.
The industrial legacy remains visible in the elevated near the soil surface, which made it difficult for most plants to survive. Areas were stripped of all vegetation, leaving expanses of exposed soil. In the most affected places, these cut deep into the surface, turning places like Kinder Scout into a moonscape.
What was exposed and eroded so quickly had taken over to form. Much of the Pennines are covered in blanket peatland, a type of bog made through the slow accumulation of partially decayed plant matter (the type of soil we call peat).
The , with the water table maintained high enough to limit the decomposition of plant matter, while still allowing plants to grow. Not just any plant can tolerate these harsh growing conditions. One species is truly specialised to bog life and forms the main building block of peat itself 鈥� Sphagnum.
Finding a super moss
Sphagnum moss is the key ecosystem engineer in peatlands, holding up to in water to maintain the saturated conditions needed for its growth.
When in a healthy state, new Sphagnum grows up through the older moss, raising the water table with it to leave the older moss submerged, partially decayed, which forms the peat itself. Bogs grow only millimetres per year, but over millennia this can build several metres of peat.
The organic nature of peat means it is carbon rich, so much so that UK peatlands store over , around ten times more than all .
Restored wetlands could also help protect the area from wildfires at the UK starts to see more .
Human pressure and pollution
With human pressures, including past industrial pollution, . Sphagnum has disappeared from these peatlands.
Now, peatland restoration efforts are under way. From the early 2000s organisations including Moors for the Future Partnership have spent decades blocking gullies to raise water tables, reseeding bare peat and , transforming the worst affected peatlands from dark .
Though blocking erosional gullies with stone or timber dams has in deeply eroded peat, restoring flatter moorland plateaux presents a different set of challenges. Namely, how to restore the wet conditions required to encourage more Sphagnum moss to grow. However, this hasn鈥檛 stopped restoration organisations from trying a novel restoration method which might work to restore flatter peatlands.
Five years on from the start of the project, the original bunds are covered with grasses and many pools are now brimming with Sphagnum moss, looking more like natural bog pools.
are crescent-shaped pools, created by digging shallow scrapes in the peat surface using special low impact excavators. The aim is to capture surface water which would otherwise run quickly off the hill after rainfall. The water stored in at the bog surface for Sphagnum moss to re-establish and grow on moorland plateaus.
The National Trust, in partnership with the University of Manchester, is undertaking long-term research to understand the potential for bunds as a peatland restoration method.
The followed one of the driest springs in England for over .
It provided the first test of extreme weather in this peat bund experiment. Preliminary monitoring during the 2025 drought suggests bunded areas remained wetter for longer than unrestored peat, helping to maintain wetter conditions near the peat surface for longer 鈥� the .
The excavator machines up on the hills today don鈥檛 signal a return to the industrial past, but an attempt to restore the damage it left behind.
, Honorary Research Associate in Peatland Hydrology,
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