Waldridge Fell SSSI is a broadly rectangular area, lying between the valleys of two tributaries of the River Wear, the Cong Burn to the north-west and the South Burn to the south-east.
Over most of the area, the habitat is heathland, in which the dominant species is ling, Calluna vulgaris, except on shallower soils, where bilberry, Vaccinium myrtillus, and, to a lesser extent, crowberry, Empetrum nigrum, are dominant [REF].