Controlled Burning

Writing in The Telegraph, Lord Botham has delivered a blunt assessment of England's worsening wildfire season and the policy decisions behind it.

The Moorland Association has written to the Prime Minister on upland fuel loads and wildfire risk. Read our letter and provisional fuel load model.

The Moorland Association responds to Ben Goldsmith's Spectator claim that rewilding beats wildfire. The New Forest was drained, is managed, and still burns.

Explore how Natural England's shift on wildfire prevention emphasizes vegetation fuel reduction. Discover why policy must follow this crucial step.

A moorland fire is really two fires. Why rewetting and managing the fuel solve two different problems — and why the uplands need both.

A study of 206 wildfires in England and Wales finds grass moors burn biggest, heather hottest, and managed burning keeps fires smaller.

Vegetation is the one wildfire factor land managers can control. The Moorland Association calls for an evidence-led look at how conservation landscapes are managed.

Watch Moorland Association member George Winn-Darley explain how controlled burning helps regenerate the landscape and reduce the risk of wildfire.

The Moorland Association’s free wildfire training course is now trusted by the National Trust for Scotland. It takes under an hour and is open to everyone.

No one is in charge of wildfire in England. The fire services and the Moorland Association agree on the fix: a funded, cross-government national strategy.

A single 2025 wildfire destroyed 80% of a managed moor and centuries of peat — evidence to Parliament on what wildfire costs nature, and why the fix is stalled.

MPs clashed over controlled burning and wildfire risk in the Commons on 13 July. What was said about moorland fuel loads, and where the real disagreement lies.