Site Condition Monitoring

Site Condition Monitoring is Scottish Natural Heritage's programme for monitoring the condition of nature conservation features of special interest on designated sites in Scotland. These features of special interest are known as 'natural features' and may be habitats (eg. woodland, marine reef, freshwater loch), species populations (eg. otter, dotterel, marsh fritillary butterfly) or geological formations (eg. cave, fossil bed, volcanic exposures) .

The purpose of Site Condition Monitoring is to determine the condition of the designated natural feature within a site.  This is to establish whether the natural feature is likely to maintain itself in the medium to longer term under the current management regime and wider environmental or other influences. There are in excess of 5400 individual natural features of special interest hosted on designated sites which are monitored on a rolling programme through Site Condition Monitoring.

How is SCM carried out?

Find out how we go about this challenging task

How is monitoring information collected?

The nuts and bolts of gathering information in the field

Assessment of condition

What makes the difference between favourable and unfavourable?

Why are activities and management considered?

What we take into account in judging site condition

How the results of SCM are used

SCM information is valuable in many ways

Favourable condition targets

Scottish Government targets for habitats and species in protected areas