Kinder Scout is an icon of the Peak District, standing 636 metres at its highest point and dominating the Dark Peak landscape. It’s the location of the 1932 Mass Trespass which sparked the creation of the UK’s first national park 75 years ago this year and of countless walker adventures in the decades since. The history of Kinder Scout is as fascinating as it’s gritstone feature.
Research has even produced evidence of new overnight visitors. Twenty years ago any intrepid walkers would have encountered a very different landscape to the one found today. Almost devoid of vegetation, the plateau was a vast expanse of arid, exposed peat, lifeless and desolate. Even as recently as 2014 the green mossy landscapes peppered with bog pools which are teeming with insect life in 2024 were absent. Restoration work by Moors for the Future Partnership and land owners the National Trust has transformed the landscape into a thriving ecosystem, providing an expanse of healthy habitat for mountain hare, short-eared owls and red grouse.
One mammal visitor is creating a great deal of excitement. Nestled well into the centre of the Kinder plateau, a new scientific study by the Derbyshire Bat Group is looking for evidence of bat activity at high altitude, including foraging. The areas of study are the Moors for the Future Partnership science and monitoring trial sites which total three hectares on Kinder Scout.
These important areas of the upland restoration research were put in place back in 2012 to act as control sites to monitor and compare data with all subsequent peatland restoration across the Peak District and South Pennines. Exploratory research back in 2020 created a buzz in the peatland community as audio recordings documented the first findings of five species of bats on the iconic plateau, including brown long-eared and common pipistrelle which can consume thousands of insects in one evening. With trees and therefore potential roosting positions quite some distance away in the valley, to have bats flying up to the highest point in the Peak District to feed suggests an abundant supply of insects and therefore a healthier ecosystem on an upward trajectory of recovery.
Bat detectors have now been stationed on the two research sites on Kinder Scout, where they will stay for the whole Summer recording the echolocation calls of bats. This will identify what species are there and how they are using the two different sites, the bare peat control site which has been left unrestored and one area planted in a high density with bog building sphagnum moss.
Sphagnum moss stores high volumes of water to create the boggy conditions insects love. The detectors will pick up the navigation sounds of the bats, as well as the feeding call that gets faster and faster as they hone in on their meal, known as a feeding buzz. This will allow more accurate analysis of their specific behaviours on the upland over a number of months.
So far, the team already have already discovered that short-eared owls are present and using the bat detector station as a perch as they have been leaving their owl pellets near the post. By comparing acoustic data being recorded over this summer from the two sites it will be possible to see the impact of the restoration work on wildlife. This is the first time meaningful acoustic data will be collected about bat activity on the site, providing valuable information about the importance of connectivity between woodland and moorland in terms of how far species will commute from their roosts to feed.
