CONSULTATION has started on how best to manage Wootton Ridge, on Exmoor, as long-term plans are prepared to ensure joined up management of the open areas of grassland and heathland.

The ridge includes parts of Grabbist Hill, Alcombe Common, Hopcott Common, and Wootton Courtenay, but not woodland areas.

Exmoor National Park Authority wants its management to be tied in with neighbouring areas such as Tivington Woods.

The land comes under five different landholders, including Forestry England, the National Trust, and Minehead Town Council, for whom the consultation is being carried out along with Butterfly Conservation.

The town council owns all of the Alcombe Common ridge area which is registered common land and makes up about one-third of the site.

Much of the site also forms part of Dunster Park and Heathlands Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI), particularly the extensive areas of lowland heathland habitat.

As well as an online questionnaire, the consultation includes a drop-in event in Minehead Library on Monday, September 11, from 10 am to 5 pm.

A live online webinar will also be run by Footprint Ecology, which is carrying out the consultation, on either Thursday, September 7, at 1 pm, or Wednesday, September 13, at 7 pm.

A link to a recording of the webinar will be made available after the events for anybody unable to make either of the two dates.

Footprint Ecology spokeswoman Emma Bishop said: “The area is important for its ecological, landscape, and historical interest. 

“It is also valued by local people and a wide range of user groups.

“Ongoing scrub, bracken, and sapling encroachment is, however, causing the quality of some of the important ecological and landscape features within the area to slowly deteriorate.

“It is also increasing the fuel load, increasing the risk of damaging wildfires.

“These changes are having a negative impact upon important animal and plant species found on the site, and there is a risk that some of the rarer and more specialised species could ultimately be lost.

“We are therefore seeking views on the future management of the site from all interested parties.”

Ms Bishop said it was intended any future management of the area should maintain existing access for all users.

She said the area included an Iron Age hillfort on Grabbist Hill and potentially the remains of a medieval or post-medieval ridge and furrow system.

It was also home to the heath fritillary, which was one of the rarest and most threatened butterfly species and found only in a handful of locations in the UK.

Ms Bishop said there were large areas of lowland heathland, which was important because 80 per cent of the UK’s heathlands had been lost in the past two centuries due to land use change, changing agricultural practices, and urbanisation.

The SSSI was also designated for important grassland and oak woods, including wood pasture with ancient trees, and a wide range of rare and specialised species which used the habitats.

Rare species included specialist heathland breeding birds such as the Dartford warbler and nightjar, the localised pink meadowcap toadstool, and a nationally-important range of beetles associated with veteran trees.

Ms Bishop said large-scale felling operations would continue as a regular management/harvesting activity because Forestry England managed its holdings for timber production and had a 10-year vision for the area.

The management plan would also look to create areas of wooded heath outside the SSSI and to improve the condition of neighbouring SSSI units which had deteriorated due to the effects of under-grazing and scrub encroachment.

Ms Bishop said a number of management options could be applied to Wootton Ridge, some of which could be used in combination, including:

• Doing nothing

• Scrub control

• Vegetation control (including swaling and cut and collect)

• Grazing

An online consultation questionnaire will be live from Monday, August 14, to Saturday, September 30, and can be accessed via the Exmoor National Park website.

More information about the consultation and paper and electronic copies of the questionnaire can be obtained by emailing [email protected] or calling 01929 552444.