Carrowcarlin is a basin wetland supporting a range of plant communities, including species-rich type of fen that are rare in Northern Ireland. Some pockets of scrub and wet acid grassland also occur.
The fen is dominated by bottle sedge, sharp-flowered rush and Yorkshire fog, growing over the brown moss Calliergon cuspidatum. Notable species include slender sedge, lesser tussock-sedge, greater tussock-sedge, great fen-sedge, many-stalked spike-rush, black bog-rush and blunt-flowered rush forming communities that are characteristic of wetlands in south-east Down, but rare in N.I. as a whole.
The site is also important for invertebrates. Notable species include the rare water beetles Cercyon ustulatus and Hydaticus seminiger, the spiders Clubiona stagnatilis and Floronia bucculenta and the pond skater Gerris lateralis.
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