BES Facebook groupBritish Woodlands More Homogenous than in Past
British woodlands are more similar to one another today than 70-years ago, report researchers today in the Proceedings of the Royal Society B.
A team of scientists from the Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, led by Sally Keith at the University of Bournemouth, surveyed 86 sites in Dorset, comparing the plant species found against records of plant species found in the 1930s. The results show that the woodlands are more homogenous than in the past. The researchers conclude that changes in traditional methods of woodland management, for example a reduction in coppicing, has had an impact; reducing the light to the woodland floor and affecting plant growth.
Commenting on the research, Sally Keith says: “The results show that we must monitor biodiversity at the landscape scale, as well as gain a better understanding of processes affecting our native flora, if we are to conserve and restore the character of the traditional British woodland.”
August 3rd, 2009 at 11:44 am
I just wonder why it is assumed that managed woodland and the opportunitic species it attracts is necessarily the natural ideal. Thus the conclusion of greater shade as a detractor just seems to be aping that of the English Nature Research Report 653 – “Long-term ecological change in British woodlands (1971-2001)). That study noted it was a value judgement that favoured open habitat species in woodlands. It also questioned whether it is feasible to return to the high levels of species richness shown in their baseline survey for plants if this was a consequence of a one-off set of circumstances around the specific management of woodland in the mid-twentieth century? They say the same argument might also apply to butterflies and birds in woodland, as it does to plants. I would say that the argument also applies to this study of Dorset woodland! If the trend is to a homogenisation then this surely is a reflection that it is woodland species that are occupying woodland spaces. England has one of the lowest woodland covers in Europe, and consequently one of the smallest amounts of woodland interior habitat. To impose open habitat species sets on such extant woodland through “management” seems onerous, and does not admit other realities for our wild nature.