Learning from local ecological knowledge to improve biodiversity around boreal temporary wetlands

 My interest in wetlands started when I was working back in Nepal and grew later when I got to research more during my MSc in the Netherlands. I had worked in Ramsar sites and the restoration of the urban lakes before, but I decided to pursue temporary wetlands as my research area for my PhD. I have always been interested to work in the interface of natural and social sciences, thus I saw great implications of my interests to study this important habitat which till date is an understudied topic. Thankfully, I also have supervisors with background in biology, ecology and social sciences that allows me to receive continuous support and feedback integrating both domains.

Often known as “'isolated”, “vernal”, “seasonal”, “ephemeral” wetlands, the temporary wetlands are isolated in the landscape, meaning that they are not connected to inlets / outlets. They are characterized by the seasonal hydroperiod meaning that they dry up usually once a year (with some exceptions drying in every few years). Seasonal wetlands are also widely used by terrestrial vertebrates as refuge, foraging sites and water point at different stages of their life cycle. In addition, they have been used as a source of water for different provisional services.

Temporary wetland in Evo, Finland

Due to their limited size, they can be extremely vulnerable to environmental changes, including climate change, and society development needs. The economic, cultural and biodiversity challenges surrounding these small wetlands are therefore important, yet the lack of rigor and coherence in the regulatory protection of small aquatic resources remain a global phenomenon.

However, due to their seasonality, sizes, occurrence and distribution in the landscape, temporary wetlands are quite complex when it comes to detection and monitoring only with remote sensing technologies. Thus, with an objective to study the ecosystem functions of small temporary wetlands in Finnish harvested forest, their biodiversity and associated socio-cultural connectivity and creating value through scientific and local ecological knowledge for their sustainable management. I am integrating local ecological knowledge (including knowledge, experiences and suggestions from the local researchers, visitors and experts) and deploying participatory mapping. 

My first goal was to investigate the previous knowledge on temporary wetlands. I am currently preparing for a review paper on current state of knowledge around the temporary wetland. A first draft has been written and awaits comments from co-authors.

My second goal was to identify and conduct interviews of stakeholders. With the help of my PhD supervisors and the established collaborations between Lammi Biological Station and a large network of stakeholders I was able to interview seven stakeholders for the research. I have finished stakeholders’ assessment and have identified 23 stakeholders, their interests, influences and contributions to this project. The stakeholders involve experts from research organisations, NGOs, universities, local stakeholders, journalists and regular visitors and will continue to interview and conduct field works in the coming days.

Uma Sigdel

The grant from Environmental Research Foundation of Lammi Biological Station was used at the beginning of my PhD project. The support from the foundation was crucial to start my project since it allows me to travel to and to stay at LBS to carry out interviews of stakeholders. I travelled and conducted field study in Evo five times during 2021.

With little over a year of starting my research, I am very thankful to the support I have received from different stakeholders and interests towards this research. Interviews, interactions and workshops are continuous process to this research, and I have only received positive responses to my approach for interviews, data collection and any collaboration requests. Most mentionably, I have been receiving continuous support from Lammi Biological Station, WATBRO and POOL Projects. This research project is a collaborative, multidisciplinary project and is involving multistakeholders. It is initiating many interesting  discussions on lesser studied topic around temporary wetlands and need of devising a monitoring tool to improve biodiversity in boreal wetlands.

The grant from LBAYS fund was crucial for the realization of my PhD project.

Uma Sigdel is a 2021 LBAYS grant recipient

Vernal pools: Hotspots of biodiversity?

 

In January 2020, I started my master’s thesis at Lammi Biological Station (LBS) studying vernal pools and their roles in the enhancement of the vertebrate biodiversity. A vernal pool is a natural pool with a typical water cycle of filling and drying. One of the main consequences of human activity is biodiversity loss. Loss of biodiversity in temporary wetlands, such as ephemeral pools, are much less studied than in permanent wetlands, ponds, and lakes. Vernal pools are threatened by water contamination due to road de-icing salt, ditching practices since the 1950s, and climate change. The aim of my study was to investigate the role of vernal pools for vertebrate communities by comparing the activity and species richness of birds and mammals between 10 ephemeral ponds, and 10 permanent wetlands.

In order to carry out this study, my fieldwork has been done in Evo along winter and spring 2020, through bird sightings, camera trapping, faeces tracking, and snap-trapping.

Thanks to the fieldwork, I found out that bird’s activity depends on the season and the habitat. The results revealed higher activity in vernal pools in spring while in winter no differences have been observed between both habitats. Moreover, my results highlighted that the activity and species richness of large mammals were significantly higher by vernal pools than by permanent wetlands; and herbivorous mammals such as moose, roe deer and hare, seemed to visit more often vernal pools than permanent wetlands. In the case of small mammals, despite no difference in abundance between both habitats, their activity changed monthly within the two habitats. In parallel, I conducted dissection of rodents to determine their age and their physical conditions (length, weight, body mass index etc.) but no differences have been found.

Those results demonstrated that vernal pools are providing high benefits to mammals and birds, which should be considered in forest management and in the context of climate change.

In July 2020 I graduated in my University in France and in the next year, the October 1^st, 2021, a manuscript based on my research has been accepted for publication in the Global Ecology and Conservation Journal: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.gecco.2021.e01858

Spending the 6 months in LBS has been an amazing experience. I met fantastic people and I am very grateful for their help during my research.

I want to thank the foundation for supporting my research.

Charly Dixneuf is 2020 LBAYS grant recipient

Investigation of boreal forest integrity for the conservation of mammal species in Finland

Lammi Biological Station has been my home for almost two years and is where I mainly conduct my doctoral research, which is the analysis of forest ecological integrity in relation to anthropogenic pressure. For this reason, I conducted my research fieldwork in forests privately owned by Finnish landowners living in the Kanta-Häme region, which is characterized by patchy forests and agricultural landscapes, making it ideal for the assessment of forest integrity. Thanks to this, I have the opportunity not only to learn more about the forests surrounding the Lammi area, but also about the local people and their views on the importance of forest corridors for the conservation of wildlife, especially for native species to boreal forests.

Forest integrity is often difficult to fully understand and measure because it describes the completeness and functionality of an ecosystem and its ecological processes, especially in relation to its natural state. In my doctoral research, using the Forest Landscape Integrity Index (the first consistent measure of ecological integrity for all the world’s forests), I am analysing the state of boreal forests in relation to the presence, abundance and richness of mammal species monitored through the Wildlife Triangle Scheme. Thanks to this, it will be possible to identify threshold values for forest integrity and set specific conservation targets for wildlife conservation, that should aim to increase favorable habitats for native species. Considering this, from the results of my first research, it is possible to observe that the species native to the Finnish boreal forests have a higher abundance in forests with higher integrity (in particular, mountain hare, lynx, moose, wolverine, and pine marten) than non-native and/or northly expanding species whose abundance increases in forests with lower integrity, indicating a greater adaptive capacity of these species, even in areas with higher human presence. 

In my research on camera-trapping, I will also evaluate forest integrity as a variable characterizing forest corridors, which are important components of landscape connectivity for allowing the movement of animals between habitat patches. Forest connectivity, including forest integrity, is influenced by human activities and affects wildlife. This analysis will be significant because it will be possible to understand which specific features the corridors need to constitute efficient elements for favoring the conservation of native species and for predicting and avoiding the spread of invasive species.

Francesca Malcangi is a 2022 LBAYS grant recipient. You can find out more about Francesca from her website: https://francescamalcangi.eu/ and on Twitter: @francescamalca3