£8million Heritage Horizon Award to visionary Fens Peatland project - Heritage Fund with The Wildlife Trust for Bedfordshire, Cambridgeshire and Northamptonshire

How The Wildlife Trust for Bedfordshire, Cambridgeshire and Northamptonshire is exploring the potential of wetland farming to tackle climate change and ecological crises.

Forget artificial insulation – in the future, our houses could be kept warm with bulrush seed-heads. The plant is one of several being grown as part of Peatland Progress: A New Vision for the Fens, supported by a Heritage Horizon Award of more than £8m.

Thanks to National Lottery players, the purchase of a parcel of land – Speechly’s Farm – will bring together two halves of the Great Fen and see land transformed into a mix of reedbeds, open water, and wet and dry grassland, providing additional habitat for the threatened wildlife.

The partnership project will develop a model of agricultural production, which they hope will inspire and change farming practice on peat soils across the UK.

Bulrush, reed, floating sweet grass and sphagnum moss can be grown in water-logged areas – keeping peat wet, preventing soil erosion and oxidisation and locking in CO2.

The Wildlife Trust and their partners are exploring uses for these experimental crops:

• The fluffy seed-heads of bulrush are already used in Germany to make insulation products for walls and roof spaces, and have the potential to be used in sustainable packaging.
• Sphagnum moss can replace peat as a growing medium for salad crops and its absorbent and antiseptic properties have medical and sanitary applications such as wound-dressing.
• Reeds are used traditionally for thatching and can also be processed into sheet material or used as biofuel.