IRELAND · DESIGNATIONS · NATURA 2000
SAC (Ireland)
What this layer shows
Special Area of Conservation: European-level protection for habitats and non-bird species under the Habitats Directive. The designation behind most Appropriate Assessment screening in Ireland. Certain farming and forestry activities on designated land need NPWS consent.
Publisher and licence
NPWS / Government of Ireland · CC BY 4.0
© NPWS / Government of Ireland, CC BY 4.0
Where the data comes from
ARCGIS · services-eu1.arcgis.com
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Facts shown for each feature
Site code · County · Area (ha)
In these presets
Desk study
The designations an Irish ecologist checks first: SACs and SPAs (the sites behind Appropriate Assessment screening), Natural Heritage Areas and proposed NHAs, Ramsar sites, statutory Nature Reserves and Refuges for Fauna, National Parks, and ancient & long-established woodland. The opening move of an EcIA or AA screening: what is protected on or near the site.
Habitats
Ireland's habitat evidence base: ancient & long-established woodland, the National Survey of Native Woodlands, the Irish Semi-natural Grasslands Survey, coastal lagoons and freshwater pearl mussel sensitive catchments: with SACs for statutory context. Survey layers are classified to Fossitt, the scheme Irish habitat reports are written in.
Woodland
Everything wooded in Ireland: the Ancient & Long-established Woodland inventory and the National Survey of Native Woodlands habitat polygons, with SACs on for the designated oak woods. Long-established woodland is irreplaceable habitat: whether a wood appears on the first-edition OS map is usually the first thing a client needs to know.
Coastal & wetland
The Irish coast and its wetlands: coastal lagoons (a priority Annex I habitat), Ramsar sites, and the SPAs and SACs that sit over almost every estuary: with statutory Nature Reserves, which in Ireland are so often coastal. The set for intertidal, estuary and wetland bird work.