This is an extract of the Priority Habitat Inventory spatial dataset (that describes the geographic extent and location of Natural Environment and Rural Communities Act (2006) Section 41 habitats of principal importance), taken from version 2.1. Land mapped as coastal floodplain grazing marsh; purple moor grass and rush pasture and lowland meadow identified as already support breeding waders or with high potential to be restored for breeding waders have been extracted to form this eligibility layer, with ineligible habitat overlaps removed.

GS9 and GS10 are management options in the Countryside Stewardship scheme, designed to maintain or restore wet grassland for breeding wading birds through provision of feeding habitat and a suitable sward structure for nesting (GS9), or to provide suitable habitat for wintering wildfowl and wading birds on wet grassland (GS10).These can be selected for Higher Tier agreements, and are available to Mid Tier agreements with approval from Natural England. This layer will be used as a simple check to illustrate to applicants where this option may be eligible.

A number of data layers from different sources were geo-processed to produce this layer. The main source layer was the Priority Habitat Inventory. This was restricted to coastal floodplain grazing marsh; purple moor grass and rush pasture and lowland meadow. Also, only included contiguous blocks of land greater than 10ha.

A number of habitat types were then excluded from the area: • Ancient woodland • National Forestry Inventory • PHI Deciduous woodland • PHI Lowland calcareous grassland • PHI Lowland dry acid grassland • PHI Lowland fens • PHI Lowland heathland • PHI Lowland raised bog • PHI Reedbeds • PHI Traditional orchards • PHI Upland hay meadow • FC Unmanaged woodland • NE Wood pasture and parkland.

To be updated in line with updates to the underlying Priority Habitat Inventory Data.

Full metadata can be viewed on data.gov.uk.