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Changes in the Cumbrian countryside: First report of the National Countryside Monitoring Scheme 1987

Abstract

For a quarter of a century the Nature Conservancy Council and others have carried out various survey and monitoring projects relevant to nature conservation, but most of these have related to particular sites or to species or groups of plants or animals rather than to the countryside at large. The National Countryside Monitoring Scheme (NCMS) was set up to fill this gap, by providing data on the distribution and extent of the various structural components or features of the countryside and on the changes that have occurred to them since the Second World War. Never before has an attempt been made to measure the extent and change of wildlife habitats in detail on a national scale.

Such a major undertaking could only be based on a sample survey, and aerial photographs are the only consistent source of data over the time span that is involved. The sampling had to be stratified to take account of regional and altitudinal variation in land-use; it was therefore decided to base the study on counties (or districts in Scotland) and on three levels or "land types" within each area treated. An automated data-processing system was required to handle the large quantities of information, and this involved photogrammetric plotting, digital mapping and statistical analysis.

Cumbria was chosen as the first county to survey. This report introduces the methods adopted, the principal findings and the implications for nature conservation of the changes in the Cumbrian countryside between the 1940s and the 1970s. Aerial photographic coverage for the 1980s is insufficient to provide equivalent data for full comparisons with the position in the 1940s and the 1970s, but it has proved possible to estimate annual rates of change for some of the principal features from about a third of the area used for the main study. The results, presented in a supplement, at the end of the report, suggest that the trends observed in the main study have generally persisted over the last decade.

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Resource type Publication

Topic category Environment

Reference date 1987··

Citation
Budd, J., Oswald, P. & Welsh, P. 1987. Changes in the Cumbrian countryside, Research & Survey in nature conservation 6. NCC, Peterborough, ISBN 0 86139 374 0.

Lineage
First report of the National Countryside Monitoring Scheme, including both methods and results.

Responsible organisation
Communications, JNCC publisher

Limitations on public access No limitations

Use constraints Available under the Open Government Licence 3.0

Metadata date 2026·01·09

Metadata point of contact
Communications, JNCC

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