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SFI26 UPL8

Shepherding livestock on moorland (remove stock for at least 4 months) (updated for SFI26)

Payment Details

Annual payment rate
£74 / ha
Agreement duration
3 years

Official action requirements

What you must do

You must remove all livestock, except resident ponies, from land entered into this action for at least 4 consecutive calendar months. ‘Resident ponies’ means ponies which are traditionally kept on the moorland, such as Dartmoor and Exmoor ponies. When the livestock are on the moorland, you must take reasonable steps to minimise their access to ‘sensitive features’ by: shepherding or herding them away using temporary fencing if that’s possible Sensitive features are areas on the moorland that can easily be damaged by grazing or poaching caused by livestock. They include: bare ground, peat soils, gullies and steep slopes vegetation on wet peaty areas – such as blanket bog, wet heath, upland flushes, fens and swamps woody vegetation – such as fragmented heath, mountain heath and willow scrub, dry heath, long degenerate heather, deciduous woodland, and scrub grassy vegetation – such as upland calcareous grassland, limestone pavement, purple moor-grass, rush pasture and Calaminarian grassland historic or archaeological features, including scheduled monuments – these are identified on your SFI HEFER You must not carry out supplementary feeding of livestock on land entered into this action, except with mineral licks. You must locate them away from sensitive areas. Supplementary feeding in extreme weather conditions You can carry out supplementary feeding of livestock in extreme weather conditions (defined as 2 or more consecutive days of deep snow or hard frost). In this case, you can feed hay or haylage, but only for the purpose of animal welfare. If you do this, you must: move the feeding sites around the land entered into this action to minimise damage to the soil and vegetation avoid transferring undesirable species which are in the hay or haylage, such as docks or rosebay willowherb You must not: feed livestock on or next to historic and archaeological features, steep slopes or footpaths use troughs or feeders You may need to reduce or remove livestock from the area to avoid damage to the soil and vegetation if you need to feed regularly during extreme weather. Produce a written stocking and shepherding calendar At the start of each year of this action’s duration, you must produce a written stocking and shepherding calendar for each land parcel entered into this action. This can be a paper-based or electronic record. The stocking and shepherding calendar must show how you plan to meet this action’s requirements, including: land parcel reference number and hectarage all the sensitive features you’ve identified in each land parcel – you can use the moorland survey completed for MOR1 or CMOR1 to show this, if it identifies sensitive features monthly numbers of livestock which will graze the land parcel, including their type and age bracket dates you plan to remove livestock and return them to the moorland shepherding or herding activities you plan to carry out when the livestock are on the moorland to avoid damaging the identified sensitive features If you manage several adjacent land parcels as one grazing unit, you can keep one stocking and shepherding calendar for that grazing unit. You must include all the land parcel reference numbers which comprise that grazing unit.

When to do it

You must do this action from its start date, throughout each year of its 3-year duration.

Evidence to keep

You must keep the required written stocking and shepherding record and supply this evidence if we ask for it. It can be recorded on paper or electronically.

SFI26 actions v2.0, updated 7 July 2026 — verified 1 Aug 2026. Open official guidance

Data Attribution

Last verified
12 Sep 2026
Scheme version
SFI26
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