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this offer in soon terms and conditions apply. Because they're so wet they're usually pretty squelchy places.

They're not muddy, they're never dirty places.

They're always so full of vegetation, so full of life, that they're wet.

And you walk across them and you'll always get wet feet if you don't wear your wellies or your walking boots.

They've got a lot of mosses there, so they carpet the landscape.

And if you look at it on the small scale, they're the understory,

and above those you've got things like the cotton grasses and the heather growing above them.

Peat bogs are an ancient part of our landscapes,

carrying their own folklore and preserving

history as they slowly transform plants into spongy black soil.

On the windswept coast of County Mayo, an ancient peat bog has buried secrets telling of our past.

A five and a half thousand-year-old agricultural community has been found, preserved perfectly by the anaerobic conditions, totally changing our understanding of what communities were like more than five millennia ago.

These other worldly spaces have inspired artists, poets and archaeologists alike, but they also provide a number of vital ecosystem services.

Peat bogs are home to a host of rare wildlife. They slow the flow of water to prevent flooding

and act as a major carbon sink. These environments are a valuable asset in the fight against climate change.

Yet despite their importance, they're under threat, and horticulture is one of the

reasons. Historically, peat has been a favoured growing medium for domestic growers and large-scale

nurseries, and 94% of Britain's raised bog and 99% of islands has been lost over the last 100 years.

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