Details of Award
NERC Reference : NE/K015486/1
Dispersal and biodiversity impacts on community assembly and ecosystem services in shallow lake landscapes
Grant Award
- Principal Investigator:
- Professor CD Sayer, University College London, Geography
- Co-Investigator:
- Professor H Bennion, University College London, Geography
- Co-Investigator:
- Professor N Willby, University of Stirling, Biological and Environmental Sciences
- Co-Investigator:
- Professor B Okamura, The Natural History Museum, Life Sciences
- Grant held at:
- University College London, Geography
- Science Area:
- Freshwater
- Overall Classification:
- Freshwater
- ENRIs:
- Biodiversity
- Global Change
- Natural Resource Management
- Pollution and Waste
- Science Topics:
- Community Ecology
- Conservation Ecology
- Palaeoenvironments
- Ecosystem Scale Processes
- Water Quality
- Abstract:
- Summary The Rio Summit of 1992 propelled biodiversity into a global spotlight pointing to tremendous human-induced species losses in the Earth's ecosystems. Now there is an urgent need to advance our knowledge on how and why species disappear from ecosystems and the implications of these losses for important goods and services that we rely on (e.g. drinking water, food, spiritual values). One crucial landscape feature thought to have a major influence on biodiversity is connectivity - how connected habitats within the landscape are with one another. A key issue here is alteration of our natural landscapes via the creation of roads, towns and farmland. Under such circumstances natural habitats become isolated and degraded which impedes the dispersal of native species. We believe, based on preliminary evidence, that ease of dispersal across the landscape is a key feature that reduces rates of species loss in human-affected ecosystems thus preserving high biodiversity and valuable (monetary and cultural values) ecosystem services. Lakes are uniquely useful for examining questions about biodiversity, connectivity and ecosystem services as they permit long-term (over centuries) changes in biodiversity to be studied through the analysis of fossil remains in sediment cores. The majority of aquatic organisms (e.g. algae, plants, invertebrates) leave identifiable parts in sediments, which can be dated to reveal a history of ecological change. In the proposed study we will focus on two UK lake districts: the Norfolk Broads, England and the Upper Lough Erne (ULE) lakes, Northern Ireland. Both contain numerous (60+) shallow lakes, have a long history of agricultural pollution (50-100 years) and have been subject to invasions of non-native species (notably zebra mussels). However, the Broads are mostly highly degraded, having generally turbid water with few plants, while the ULE lakes have generally clear waters and abundant and species-rich plant beds. We propose that this key difference relates to elevated connectivity amongst the ULE lakes due to a higher density of linking channels and the occurrence of winter floods which cover much of the system. This, we believe, enhances the exchange of plants and plant seeds, which in turn buffers against permanent plant extinctions in individual lakes, despite pressures from pollution. Through the collation and collection of data on present-day water plant abundance and diversity in many individual lakes in these two systems, analysis of the amounts of carbon, nitrogen and phosphorus taken up by plants in these lakes, and by analysing sediment cores to detect changes in aquatic plant diversity and pollution over time, our research will address the following key questions: 1. Does higher connectivity buffer biodiversity loss in the face of pollution and species invasions? 2. How do changes in water plant diversity affect key functions of lake ecosystems that in turn influence the services they provide to humans? 3. Can knowledge gained from questions 1 and 2 be translated into changed conservation practices to reduce biodiversity and ecosystem service losses from aquatic landscapes? Our project will give policy makers and conservation organisations vital information to inform landscape planning, such as the need to prioritise protection of existing high biodiversity areas (e.g. species-rich lakes) and to maintain connectivity of such sites with others. We anticipate generating an evidence-base that will argue for the maintenance or enhancement of connectivity to increase the resilience of our ecosystems to future biodiversity loss. In a world threatened by climate change, habitat fragmentation and pollution, knowledge of the relationships between dispersal, biodiversity and key ecosystem services is essential to our well being.
- NERC Reference:
- NE/K015486/1
- Grant Stage:
- Completed
- Scheme:
- Directed (Research Programmes)
- Grant Status:
- Closed
- Programme:
- BESS
This grant award has a total value of £148,014
FDAB - Financial Details (Award breakdown by headings)
| DI - Other Costs | Indirect - Indirect Costs | DA - Investigators | DI - Staff | DA - Estate Costs | DI - T&S | DA - Other Directly Allocated |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| £6,403 | £51,124 | £22,504 | £40,089 | £17,377 | £8,903 | £1,613 |
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