Dartmoor wildlife
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The remoteness of Dartmoor and the fact that a great deal of it is undisturbed for much of the year is an encouragement to the wildlife.
The more common mammals include: the Dartmoor pony; rabbits; foxes; badgers; grey squirrels; weasels; stoats; hares; and deer. Rumours abound of large wild cats such as pumas roaming wild on the moor, but little evidence has been forthcoming and until anything more substantial is available these reports should be filed under the general heading of cryptozoology.
You will also see herds of cattle and sheep apparently roaming free on the moor. In fact, all are owned by farmers and let out to graze. Each is branded - the sheep with a coloured patch on its coat, unique to its owner. The livestock will naturally remain within the territory in which they are released, although walls and cattle grids (a pit in the road covered with metal bars - impassable to hoofed animals) provide an additional level of control.
Dartmoor has given its name to two breeds of sheep - the Whiteface Dartmoor and the Greyface Dartmoor - which are descended from breeds which have roamed on the moor since at least the 17th century. They are still to be found there, but are now vastly outnumbered by the Scottish Blackface. Less common species such as Exmoor Horn and Cheviot are also to be found on Dartmoor. The most common cattle are the Galloway and Aberdeen Angus.
Reptiles include: Grass Snakes, adders, slow worms and Common Lizards.
Amphibians include: Common frog; Common toad
With its range of high grassy moorland, bogs, farmland and deep wooded valleys, Dartmoor also provides a range of habitats for rare birds. Some of those you will find (plus their favoured nesting spots) include:
- Buzzard (trees and hedgerows)
- Coal tit (pine plantations)
- Cormorant (reservoirs)
- Crossbill (pine plantations)
- Curlew (valley bogs)
- Dippers (rivers and streams)
- Dunlin (bogs)
- Goldcrest (pine plantations)
- Golden Plover (bogs)
- Goosander (rivers and streams)
- Grasshopper warbler (farmland)
- Grey Heron (rivers and streams)
- House martin (farm buildings)
- Meadow pipit (upland heathland)
- Nightjar (pine plantations)
- Owls (farm buildings)
- Peregrine falcon (tors and rocky outcrops)
- Pied flycatcher (woodland)
- Raven (tors and rocky outcrops)
- Redstart (woodland)
- Reed bunting (farmland)
- Ring ouzel (tors and rocky outcrops)
- Siskin (pine plantations)
- Skylark (upland heathland)
- Snipe (farmland and valley bogs)
- Song thrush (hedgerows and dry stone walls)
- Stonechat (upland heathland)
- Swallow (farm buildings)
- Wheatear (grass moorland, tors and rocky outcrops)
- Whinchat (grass moorland)
- Whitethroats (grass moorland)
- Wild ducks (reservoirs)
- Wood warbler (woodland)
- Yellowhammer (grass moorland)
Many of the rivers and streams support the fish species commonly to be found in Britain and Ireland; salmon and trout are also to be found in some, though less frequently than in previous times.