Bogging the limelight

LITTLE Woolden Moss near Salford has gone through a lot in its time, but we're working hard to tell its tale.

- JENNY BENNION

You wouldn't know it to look at the area between Salford and Warrington today, but this whole area was once part of one of the largest lowland raised peat bogs in the UK. Known as Chat Moss, this rare and special habitat formed after the last Ice Age and was a haven for wildlife, along with storing huge amounts of carbon.

Unfortunately, we've lost over 99 per cent of Chat Moss, due to drainage and conversion to agriculture or for peat extraction.

Little Woolden Moss nature reserve on the border of Cadishead and Irlam, is a rare surviving fragment of this once vast expanse of peatland. But it's had a chequered history.