The 'Battle of the Bogs' can scarcely have escaped anyone's attention over the past couple of years. The wrangles over the Flow Country and, before that, over Duich Moss and the Somerset Levels indicate the importance of our peatlands. However, a different kind of 'battle' is regularly being fought at peatland sites all over the country in places where one would have thought reserve status or statutory protection would surely have afforded our bogs and fens a healthy future.