Stretching for over fifty square kilometres between the historic market towns of Wellington and Newport, this ancient peatland (which was laid down at the end of the last Ice Age) has an impressive natural heritage but remains hidden in plain sight amid local attractions such as The Wrekin and the wider Meres and Mosses landscape to which it belongs.

The centrepiece of our new resource is a virtual safari of the moorlands and the wildlife that calls this former wetland area home. Despite centuries of drainage, this large, open and essentially self-contained landscape provides sanctuary for a wide range of moisture-loving plants, animals and insects that have become increasingly scarce elsewhere. We’ll show you some of the area’s most iconic flora and fauna, the habitat features that support it, and the best locations for a close encounter with the natural world. You’ll also find detailed information about cycling and walking in the area, other local heritage attractions, where to eat and drink, and the myriad opportunities for retail therapy! There’s also an interactive gallery, replete with images taken exclusively for us by acclaimed Shropshire landscape photographer Gordon Dickins. All in all, we want this to be your ‘one-stop shop’ for everything that’s good about this enigmatic and characterful place!

Aside from providing newcomers to this relatively unknown corner of Shropshire with an introduction to the natural heritage of the Weald Moors, we want our new resource to be part of the fabric of the local community, too. So, if you’re a regular moorland visitor or a local, we’d love to hear from you. If you have any photographs of the moors, sightings of local wildlife or news of upcoming events across the area you’d like to share, please get in touch and we’ll do our best to publicise them!

This website represents the latest chapter in a long-term programme by Wellington Local Agenda 21 Group to bring the east Shropshire moorlands to the attention of a much wider audience. With the support of the Big Lottery Fund, we launched an ‘Explore the Weald Moors’ natural heritage guide in 2015, which you can download in the ‘explore’ section of the site. This new web resource (which has been funded by Vogt Solar) represents part of our ongoing commitment to establish a permanent presence on the moors, highlighting its delicate ecology in a time of increasing pressure on natural resources and refreshing the link between Wellington and its rural hinterlands. Over the past few years, we’ve also hosted a number of themed wildlife walks in the area, so stay tuned to find out where and when we’ll be appearing next! In the meantime, however, may we wish you happy wildlife surfing as you begin your own moorlands odyssey.