The Lake District is experiencing soil erosion at a 'dramatic rate', and could look significantly different within 50 years, according to Dr Simon Carr, a geography expert at the University of Cumbria. He warns that extreme weather driven by climate change is stripping the fells of their soil.
Dr Carr, who contributed to the Lake District's State of the Park plan in 2018, says droughts followed by severe storms in recent years are causing the degradation. 'The conditions are absolutely perfect for causing degradation to the landscape,' he said. 'They desiccate the peaks, they dry it, they become very breakable and erode very easily when you have a storm.'
The erosion rate is about 3cm per year, and Dr Carr notes that it has taken 10,000 years to create the soils now being lost. He advocates halting grazing to allow vegetation and blanket bog to recover, which would also help store carbon and reduce flooding. However, he acknowledges such a move would be unpopular in an area reliant on upland farming.
Farmers like Sarah Chaplain-Bryce, who runs Low Bridge End Farm near Keswick, argue against a blanket ban. She has planted a forest for carbon-neutral sheep grazing and says, 'If you take farming away where's your food going to come from? I don't think you can have a blanket policy - a one-size-fits-all doesn't work.'
