7 Habitats of the South Downs National Park
Habitats are areas of land which certain animals and plants live in. The habitats in the South Downs are woodlands, rivers, wetlands, coasts, farmland, chalk downland, and heathlands.
Woodlands and Farms
Did you know that foxgloves can grow up to 1.8m tall? The foxglove has around 80 flowers on each plant. You can get many different animals on farmland. One is a fallow deer or Dama dama. Male deer are known as a buck and a female is known as a doe. In farmland there are many different types of plants like carrots, maize and wheat. Without farms we would not have bread or butter.
Rivers and Wetlands
There are many different types of plants in wetlands like willow. Willow can grow to between 35 and 50 feet tall. In the water you can get brown trout that can grow up to 50cm and can weigh up to 2kg. In wetlands you can find a common frog or Rana temporaria.
Coasts
In the water you can find a small spotted catshark. They can grow up to 75cm in length. That’s more than 2 rulers long! In the sky you can get a sanderling (Calidria Albe).
The sanderling has 3 toes so they can run faster on the sand.
Chalk downland and Grasslands
Butterflies are very common on chalk downs. One of the butterflies is a chalk hill blue. A chalk hill blue butterfly caterpillar is always found with ants. Have you ever found a chalk hill blue butterfly? Find out more here https://www.southdowns.gov.uk/count-butterflies-south-downs/
A common rock rose lives in dry grazed meadows their leaves are green but underneath they are hairy.