page_title: United Kingdom Biodiversity Action Plan
section_title: Priority habitats
hierarchical_section_title: United Kingdom Biodiversity Action Plan / Priority species and priority habitats / Priority habitats
caption_attribution_description: English: Reedbed at Chippenham Fen With pools dug out. These will gradually fill in with silt and vegetable matter and scrub. Willow and birch would begin to encroach without active management removing them. Normally no access, taken during a volunteer task.
context_page_description: The United Kingdom Biodiversity Action Plan or was the UK government's response to the Convention on Biological Diversity, opened for signature at the Rio Earth Summit in 1992. The UK was the first country to produce a national Biodiversity Action Plan. It was published in 1994 and created action plans for priority species and habitats in the UK that were most under threat so as to support their recovery.
context_section_description: Rivers
  Oligotrophic and dystrophic Lakes
  Ponds
  Mesotrophic lakes
  Eutrophic standing waters
  Aquifer fed naturally fluctuating water bodies
  Arable field margins
  Hedgerows
  Traditional orchards
  Wood-pasture and parkland
  Upland oakwood
  Lowland beech and yew woodland
  Upland mixed ashwoods
  Wet woodland
  Lowland mixed deciduous woodland
  Upland birchwoods
  Native pine woodlands
  Lowland dry acid grassland
  Lowland calcareous grassland
  Upland calcareous grassland
  Lowland meadows
  Upland hay meadows
  Coastal and floodplain grazing marsh
  Lowland heathland
  Upland heathland
  Upland flushes, fens and swamps
  Purple moor grass and rush pastures
  Lowland fens
  Reedbeds
  Lowland raised bog
  Blanket bog
  Mountain heaths and willow scrub
  Inland rock outcrop and scree habitats
  Calaminarian grasslands
  Open mosaic habitats on previously developed land
  Limestone pavement
  Maritime cliff and slopes
  Coastal vegetated shingle
  Machair
  Coastal sand dunes
  Intertidal chalk
  Intertidal boulder communities
  Sabellaria alveolata reefs
  Coastal saltmarsh
  Intertidal mudflats
  Seagrass beds
  Sheltered muddy gravels
  Peat and clay exposures
  Subtidal chalk
  Tide-swept channels
  Fragile sponge & anthozoan communities on subtidal rocky habitats
  Estuarine rocky habitats
  Seamount communities
  Carbonate mounds
  Cold-water coral reefs
  Deep-sea sponge communities
  Sabellaria spinulosa reefs
  Subtidal sands and gravels
  Horse mussel beds
  Mud habitats in deep water
  File shell beds
  Maerl beds
  Serpulid reefs
  Blue mussel beds
  Saline lagoons
caption: Reedbed at Chippenham Fen - a UK Priority Habitat
exif: {"Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image XResolution": "72", "Image YResolution": "72", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image YCbCrPositioning": "Centered", "Image ExifOffset": "102", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0200", "EXIF ComponentsConfiguration": "YCbCr", "EXIF FlashPixVersion": "0101", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "640", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "480"}