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Natural Areas
 
Natural Area Boundaries
 
Natural Areas were identified using information from a range of sources including geological maps, landscape accounts, agricultural treatises and recent data on the distribution of habitats and species, both published and unpublished. Historical studies such as county floras, where the county was often split up into ecologically coherent areas, and the land utilisation work by Dudley Stamp were authoritative sources. We consulted widely both on the boundaries of Natural Areas and their constituent Character Areas, and we believe that the boundaries provide a sensible division of England at this scale. The boundaries rarely coincide with administrative boundaries as these often bear little relationship to the natural landscape.

There are 97 terrestrial and 23 maritime Natural Areas, covering the whole of England. However, as one habitat merges into another, or one soil type grades into another, so the boundaries between Natural Areas merge. We have accommodated this natural gradation by regarding the boundaries of Natural Areas as broad transitional zones, with a minimum width of 1 km. We also recognise that around the coast there is an overlap between the terrestrial Natural Areas and its adjacent maritime Natural Area. This reflects the varying influence of maritime conditions on terrestrial habitats such as salt marsh, where the factors affecting them may arise from the sea (eg shipping induced erosion) or from the land (eg cattle grazing and agricultural use). In this way there is a flexible boundary to ensure that all maritime influenced habitats can be considered together regardless of how far inland they may be located.

The boundary data can be downloaded from the GIS section
 
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