Biological Importance
The estuary as a whole was designated as a Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI) in 1990 with the amalgamation of five previously separate SSSIs: Duddon Sands, Sandscale Haws, North Walney, Hodbarrow Lagoon and Haverigg Haws. In 1998 it was classified as a Special Protection Area (SPA).
It is a significant area for birds with an internationally important breeding population of Sandwich terns that favour the slag banks around Millom and Askam in Furness. There are also migratory bird populations of international importance, including Pintail, Red Knot and Common Redshank and, regularly, over 20,000 wintering waterfowl, including Common Shelduck, Red-breasted mergansers, Eurasian Oystercatchers, Ringed Plover, Dunlin and Eurasian Curlew.
It is also significant for Natterjack Toads. The Duddon Estuary supports one fifth of the national population of the rare amphibian that is only found at 50 sites in the UK, of which five are in the Duddon Estuary.
The estuary is botanically rich with salt marsh, sand dune and shingle communities, including a nationally rare shingle vegetation community at Haverigg Haws and North Walney.
Shingle species include Sea Sandwort, Spear-leaved Orache, Sea Rocket and Sea Kale. All the dune grasslands at Sandscale Haws, Haverigg Haws and North Walney support a rich flora with the rare Dune Helleborine.
Development has had no significant effect on the nature conservation interest of the estuary, but it is at risk from coastal defence works, grazing by agricultural stock, sea level rise, recreational pressure and bait digging.
Read more about this topic: Duddon Estuary
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