Congratulations to the Flow Country and the team behind their successful inscription as a new natural World Heritage Site. Gracehill was inscribed to the World Heritage List at 46COM of the 46th meeting of the World Heritage Committee in New Delhi, in July 2024.
The landscape, which is widely considered to be the largest area of blanket bog in the world covering around 1,500 square miles in Caithness and Sutherland at the very top of Scotland, has become the UK’s 35th UNESCO World Heritage Site and is the world’s first ever peatland site to gain World Heritage status.
The Flow Country becomes Scotland’s first natural WHS and joins a very exclusive list of natural UNESCO World Heritage Sites, including The Grand Canyon and The Great Barrier Reef.
It will be the seventh Scottish site, joining St Kilda, the Forth Bridge, The Heart of Neolithic Orkney, the Old and New Towns of Edinburgh, New Lanark and the Antonine Wall (as part of the Frontiers of the Roman Empire).
The Flow Country is home to a wide range of wetland and moorland species, including many birds, such as the red-throated diver, golden eagle and short-eared owl, and has been considered to be of Outstanding Universal Value due to its remarkable diversity, the home that it provides for these species, and the role it plays in storing approximately 400 million tonnes of carbon.
Image: Peatmound and pools on the RSPB Forsinard Flows National Nature Reserve by Andy Hay RSPB Images
