National Character Area 21
Yorkshire Dales - Natural Capital and Key Ecosystem Services
Introduction
The Yorkshire Dales NCA provides a wide range of benefits to society. Each is derived from the attributes and processes (both natural and cultural features) within the area. These benefits are known collectively as ‘ecosystem services’. The predominant services are summarised below. Further information on ecosystem services provided in the Yorkshire Dales NCA is contained in the ‘Analysis’ section of this website.
Note: The natural capital in this NCA is mapped below. This displays more recent national and publicly available data sets as used within Natural England’s 2020 Natural Capital Atlas Profiles.
The predominant ecosystem services in this NCA are also summarised below. The text contained in this section is based on the previous NCA profiles in 2014, and so is not entirely current. Further information on ecosystem services provided in the North Northumberland Coastal Plain NCA is contained in the Analysis: Ecosystem Services page of this website.
What is Natural Capital?
Natural capital means “the elements of nature that directly or indirectly produce value to people, including ecosystems, species, freshwater, land, minerals, the air and oceans, as well as natural processes and functions” (Natural Capital Committee, 2017).
It is helpful to consider natural capital in the form of a logic chain that represents the links between ecosystem assets, services, benefits and value to people. The figure below displays that logic chain. The quantity and quality of ecosystem assets (woodland, bogs, etc) support different types of ecosystem services, such as carbon sequestration or water filtration. These ecosystem services then provide different benefits to society, providing value for people. The figure also shows how management interventions, as well as pressures and drivers of change, influence this chain. Other capital inputs are also often needed for people to obtain the benefits from ecosystem services (a simple example is the processing of trees to produce wood products).
As an example, an area of woodland (ecosystem asset) may reduce air pollution created by traffic on a nearby road. This woodland is therefore improving air quality (ecosystem service) in the local area which results in cleaner air and improved health in the adjacent residential street (benefit). This cleaner air has a value because we know it impacts the health and wellbeing of communities.
Sometimes for ease of understanding, economic framing is used to give these benefits a monetary value. The figure below shows how natural capital assets support the provision of ecosystem services, benefits and value. The roots of the tree show how aspects of asset quality are critical to the provision of ecosystem services. The roots also show that geodiversity underpins the ecosystem assets and therefore the ecosystem services and benefits they can provide. It is important to remember that this diagram, and natural capital frameworks more generally, are a simplification of how nature works in practice.
Natural Capital within this NCA
In 2018, Natural England published ‘Natural Capital Indicators: for defining and measuring change in natural capital’ (Lusardi et al., 2018). This report identified key properties of the natural environment vital for the long-term sustainability of benefits, which can act as indicators of change.
These indicators are designed to inform our understanding of the state of our natural assets. The indicators highlight the importance of our natural assets for delivering which ecosystem service and the benefits they provide for society. The indicators and datasets identified in Natural England’s Natural Capital Indicators Project provide the foundation for the Natural Capital Atlas Profiles.
Natural England’s Natural Capital Atlas Profiles provide an “off the shelf” natural capital evidence base for each county or city region. They have a wide variety of uses with more information in the How to Start Using Your Natural Capital Atlas.
The Natural Capital indicators are presented on the map below by broad asset theme, displaying the natural capital within the NCA.
It is noted that not all indicators listed within the Natural Capital Atlas Profiles are included within the map as data is not yet available to measure them. Refer to the “Indicator Gaps and Limitations” of the Natural Capital Atlas Profiles for further information.
Natural Capital Atlas Profiles
The following Natural Capital Atlas Profiles cover counties within this NCA:
- 7: Cumbria
- 21: Lancashire
- 26: North East and Tees Valley Combined Authorities
- 28: North Yorkshire and York
- 42: West Yorkshire
Note that numbers and figures in the body of the text are based on the 2014 profiles, unless otherwise stated.
Provisioning services (food, fibre and water supply)
Food provision: The majority of the food produced in the NCA consists of meat from sheep and cattle. The area also produces small quantities of dairy produce. The number of dairy farms in the area is declining, with the remaining dairy enterprises generally getting bigger and more intensive.
Water availability: The NCA is the source for several notable rivers such as the Wharfe, the Ribble and the Ure, which supply water for abstraction downstream. There are a number of reservoirs in the south of the NCA, which supply drinking water to conurbations to the south. There are few naturally occurring lakes and only two minor aquifers. Headwaters are stored in much of the blanket bog which covers 22 per cent of the NCA. For information regarding the current state of water availability within this NCA, refer to the Environment Agency (Abstraction Licensing Strategy).
Regulating services (water purification, air quality maintenance and climate regulation)
Climate regulation: Large expanses of upland peat soils in the NCA are a significant carbon store, and have the potential, depending on their condition, to sequester further carbon. Research has shown that more active peatlands are vital for carbon sequestration and storage. However, estimates suggest that in their current state peat soils within the Yorkshire Dales NCA are a net source of carbon. The amount of carbon stored in peat soils and the rate at which carbon is sequestered from the atmosphere by peat-forming habitats could be increased through the restoration of habitats such as blanket bog and wet heath by means of sensitive land management practices. Tree planting in other parts of the NCA, in appropriate quantities and locations, could also help to increase carbon sequestration and storage potential.
Regulating soil quality: The NCA has eight main soil types, including large areas of peat soils on higher ground and a range of clayey and loamy soils on lower ground. The functioning of peat soils and blanket bog has been degraded in some areas through a combination of acidification resulting from historical industrial atmospheric pollution, heavy grazing, burning and drainage. Restoration of degraded peat, and protection of existing, more intact peat, is key to soil quality itself (pH, carbon content, structure, nutrient status etc) and in turn may have positive impacts on water flow paths and carbon sequestration and storage potential. Semi- natural vegetation cover on non-peat soils, combined with traditional farming/low-intensity grazing and soil flora and fauna, help to maintain soil structure, organic matter and nutrient cycling within the NCA.
Regulating water quality: For information regarding the current state of water quality within this NCA, refer to the Environment Agency (Draft river basin management plan maps).
Regulating water flow: Steep topography and high rainfall events can result in localised flooding both in the NCA and downstream, along the course of some of the major rivers originating from the area. There is potential to mitigate some of this risk through catchment-scale measures such as blanket bog and wetland restoration, improvement of agricultural soil structure and returning streams and rivers to more natural fluvial pathways, but evidence on the effectiveness of these measures at a catchment scale is currently limited.
Cultural services (inspiration, education and wellbeing)
Sense of place/inspiration: This NCA has among the strongest sense of place and capacity for inspiration of any NCA in the country. Its landscape is extremely distinctive, from the open, sweeping moorlands to the pastoral valley bottoms with their hay meadows, strong pattern of drystone walls and field barns. The karst limestone features such as outcrops and limestone pavement and the rivers that run through dramatic gorges and waterfalls, combined with well-preserved and legible historic landscapes, make the area internationally recognisable and a source of inspiration for writers and artists over the centuries. The special nature of the landscape is reflected in the fact that almost all of it falls within either the Nidderdale Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONB) or the Yorkshire Dales National Park.
Sense of history: Pastoral land use dominates much of this NCA, ensuring that visible evidence of historical land use and settlement remains unusually intact and provides a highly legible reminder of the history of the area and its people. Archaeological sites of national importance range from bronze-age burial mounds to settlements and field boundaries from pre-Roman to medieval periods, and industrial monuments such as lead mines from various periods. Exposed geological features also give a sense of history on a geological timescale.
Tranquillity: Vast stretches of open, undeveloped moorland, combined with low levels of noise and light pollution, offer a real sense of tranquillity; 96 per cent of the area is categorised as undisturbed, and the sense of tranquillity is highly valued by visitors and locals alike.
Recreation: The area is internationally renowned for the quality and wealth of access opportunities. It has a dense and well-maintained network of public rights of way (2,941 km), an unusually high proportion of open access land (60 per cent) and many long-distance walking routes and bridleways, such as the Pennine Way and Bridleway National Trails. There are also excellent opportunities for other outdoor recreation, including caving, climbing and shooting. Recreational access is encouraged and carefully managed by the Yorkshire Dales National Park Authority and Nidderdale AONB. There is an extensive programme of footpath/route maintenance carried out to avoid erosion and other damage to the landscape, and exceptionally high numbers of visitors along key routes such as the Three Peaks make this maintenance essential in order to prevent severe erosion.
Biodiversity: 96,205 ha (40 per cent) of the NCA is made up of priority habitats. Some 30 per cent of the NCA is designated as SSSI, over four- fifths of which also carries a European nature conservation designation. Habitats of international importance include limestone pavements, limestone grasslands, blanket bog, upland heath and upland hay meadows. Iconic species include black grouse, red grouse, hen harrier, red squirrel, globeflower, lady’s slipper orchid and heather species. Many semi-natural habitats in the NCA are highly fragmented, and in some areas relatively uniform and lacking in structural and biological diversity. However, much work is ongoing to improve the condition of priority habitats and increase their coverage. This NCA has very good potential to enhance the network of habitats and their resilience to climate change due to its residual semi- natural habitat and high capacity for conservation action (in terms of the AONB/National Park, number and range of active conservation organisations, and, most critically, the willingness and enthusiasm of many landowners).
Geodiversity: Outstanding for its glacio-karst landscape, the NCA holds 50 per cent of the UK’s limestone pavement and has numerous other limestone features such as dolines (as at High Mark) and gorges (such as Gordale). The area is very significant for its cave network, with around 2,000 caves deeper or longer than 5 m. The NCA’s wealth of geodiversity provides an excellent educational resource and has had a strong influence on the cultural heritage of the area through past quarrying and mining activity, and by providing materials for the distinctive traditional buildings and structures of the area.
