A casual observer might look across Hatfield Moors and wonder what all the fuss is about. Acre after acre of flat brown landscape, broken here and there by a belt of scrubby trees or a steep-sided drain full of dark brown water. Travel to nearby Thorne Moors and you will see why conservationists are excited. There you can see peatlands that have not been mined by huge milling machines, but where peat cutting took place over centuries, using spade and barrow. Next to it you can see milled peatlands in the early stages of restoration, where cotton grasses and sphagnum moss - peat forming plants - are becoming re-established, beginning the long, long process of healing over the man-made scars, building up layers of peat which make raised mires such wonderful wildlife habitats. Further on you can see the bare milling fields, awaiting the first stages of restoration.
With me is Jeff Lunn, area manager for English Nature, who is jigging with excitement at the prospect before him. Together with land at Wedholme Flow in Cumbria, English Nature has just acquired nearly 4,000 acres of peatland that will become nature reserves. At Thorne and Hatfield it will more than double the total area managed for wildlife.
Jeff and his site manager, Kevin Bull, have ambitious plans. They want to see more people, especially the locals, enjoy the moors and their special sense of place. Thorne & Hatfield Moors are one of Yorkshire's best-kept secrets. Access will have to be controlled, for the moors can be dangerous places, with deep bogs and standing water ready to trap the unwary. Wildlife will need protection from disturbance too. There is enough space to manage this though, and the adders, roe deer and hoped-for marsh harriers, will thrive.
Peat mining will continue on half of Hatfield Moor for another two years and there are small, local firms cutting peat from the moors, but the deal struck last week must be the biggest gain for nature conservation ever. So that our gain doesn't become another country's loss, by drawing imports of peat from abroad, it remains just as important that gardeners, growers, all of us, switch to peat-free products.
