Jackson, Ian. Northumberland Rocks — 50 extraordinary rocky places that tell the story of the Northumberland landscape. Newcastle upon Tyne : Northern Heritage, 2021.
The richly illustrated and accessible book series of Northumberland, Cumbria and Durham Rocks are available to purchase from Northern Heritage.
Theme: Climate and landscape change
Close to the Kielder Water Tower Knowe Visitor Centre. A 1 kilometre walk up from the Lakeside Trail. Falstone Moss is signposted
Falstone Moss is a bog, an area of peatland, in Kielder Forest, and one of the famous Border Mires. Thanks to Forest Enterprise you can walk on a boardwalk over it.
Across northern and western Northumberland the glaciers left a landscape of humps and hollows. In the hollows shallow lakes formed. Gradually vegetation filled those lakes and then spread over the surrounding country. Over thousands of years the vegetation turned to peat. This bog started to grow when the climate warmed after the last Ice Age around 11,000 years ago.
Only 3% of the Earth’s land is covered in peat bog, but they are the largest carbon store we have. They have grown very slowly, only about a millimetre every decade, and are a crucial resource that we do not want to lose.
Species like red grouse, adder, roe deer, common lizard and hairy eggar moth caterpillars live here. In summer the central pool becomes alive with dragonflies and damselflies. Sphagnum mosses, the main peat-forming plants grow alongside the boardwalk and also bog asphodel, and cranberry. The Moss is a Northumberland Wildlife Trust Nature Reserve.
Close to the Kielder Water Tower Knowe Visitor Centre. A 1 kilometre walk up from the Lakeside Trail. Falstone Moss is signposted