Morridge Hill Country Habitat Restoration Tender

Morridge Hill Country (MHC) is one of DEFRA's Landscape Recovery Projects and is located within the South West Peak of the Peak District National Park. It is an ambitious landscape scale project with nature recovery at its heart.

Whilst the area is already relatively biodiverse compared to other parts of the country, there are significant opportunities here to restore ecosystems and increase resilience to change, and in doing so providing many additional benefits.

As part of the 20-30 year vision for MHC we are exploring opportunities to:

• diversify currently species-poor and depleted vegetation, including grasslands, mires, heaths etc.
• restore a more natural hydrologically functioning landscape.

We are therefore seeking updated vegetation survey of the extent and condition of the in-bye land across c.865ha together with Hydrological study and associated field survey. These surveys will inform recommendations for habitat restoration across the landscape (Opportunity mapping reports).

Scope and requirements for each site:

1. Updated survey of the extent and condition of vegetation types currently present across the area

• Across the sites, map the current extent and type of the vegetation together with supporting habitats such as open water.
• Boundaries of the main vegetation types in each field should be recorded and registered with the appropriate NVC code.

2. Hydrological study and field survey :

A: Study

• Review of existing surveys;
• Review of the hydrogeology/soils;
• Review existing data pertaining to drainage;
• Sub surface drains;
• Wetness index.

B: Field survey

• Undertake field survey of all hydrological features identified through the desk review process.;
• Each feature should be given a unique mapped identifying code;
• Individual parameters for each feature should be recorded as shown in the example spreadsheet provided at Appendix B or as otherwise agreed;
• Undertake soil profile augers/probes where considered necessary;
• Undertake soil moisture and compaction measurements (e.g soil penetrometer) where considered necessary;
• Undertake any pH and conductivity measurements where considered necessary.

3. Opportunity mapping document:

Brief opportunity mapping report for each site. This should pull together all the above information to identify opportunities for habitat restoration to include:

• Likely outcomes on Proposed Hydrological regime and how this will differ from the current situation (including completed spreadsheet Appendix B*);
• Specifications for suggested works and methodology;
• Likely changes to vegetation, species composition and condition with reference to NVC types where appropriate;
• Details and specification for all methods proposed for introduction of plant species;
• Identify any additional benefits to the works;
• Steps in the process to such a recovery;
• Likely impacts on the site and surrounding land;
• Consider partial restoration scenarios and likely outcomes;
• Schedule of works and Costings to achieve the above.

Maps:

• Map to show wetland conceptualisation plan showing likely influence of works and locations and type of hydrological interventions;
• Before and after maps to show water supplies and drainage networks-includes routes of water into and out of areas;
• Map to show current habitat types (with NVC notation);
• Map to show potential habitat change as result of proposals;
• Map to show where areas could be planted or seeded with 'missing' plant components relative to the target vegetation type including higher plants and sphagnums;
• Constraints map
• Map showing any infrastructure required to enable landscape management.

Timescales

This is a time sensitive project, we are looking for this work to be completed as soon as possible. All surveys must be completed by the 30th September 2025.

Draft reports must be provided by 15th October 2025

Final report must be provided by 30th October 2025

All other outputs (data) associated with the Brief must be provided by 30th October 2025 (the Target Completion Date).

Please see the Invitation to Tender Brief and associated documents for further details