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.
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.
Temporary wetland in Evo, Finland
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
