Temporal variation in biodiversity and ecosystem service delivery in grasslands (T-BESS)

人类对自然环境的影响达到了前所未有的程度。这造成的后果之一是世界范围内生物多样性的下降。然而，尽管我们依赖生态系统提供的许多服务是以生物多样性为基础的，但我们对生物多样性丧失对生态系统服务提供的后果知之甚少。该项目将调查草原生态系统提供的生态系统服务在多大程度上随着时间的推移而发生变化，重点放在过去50年人类影响的关键时期。我们将通过重复1965年在英格兰北部彭宁地区进行的广泛的植被调查来做到这一点。我们还将利用1990年部分重新调查的数据。这次调查的重点将是石灰性草原。这种物种丰富的栖息地构成了多功能景观的重要组成部分，通过农业提供供应服务，同时对支持、监管和文化服务也很重要。我们将重访1965年调查过的遗址，并用同样的方法记录下来。我们还将纳入2012年夏季完成的调查的酸性草原部分的重复结果。我们将使用一系列自然资本存量和流动的指标，其中一些我们将直接衡量，例如蜜蜂花蜜来源(调节服务授粉的指标)，以及其他指标，例如每年地上净初级生产力(支持服务初级生产力的指标)，我们将利用植物特征来推断。我们还将使用外部数据来促进和测试Wessex Bess项目中正在开发的生态系统服务指标。我们将分析收集到的数据，以考察自1965年以来，由于相关自然资本的变化，生态系统服务的提供可能发生了怎样的变化。我们还将整理这段时间内气候、空气污染和土地利用强度等变化驱动因素的数据。通过量化地将驱动因素和生态响应联系起来，我们将确定生态系统服务交付的变化驱动因素。使用多元统计，我们还将评估数据集中的空间和时间模式，以测试在评估生态系统服务提供时使用空间换时间替代的有效性。我们将使用这个项目中产生的数据来创建一个工具，其中可以使用关于植被物种组成的数据在排序空间内被动地绘制地点，以确定生态系统服务提供的水平。该工具将有助于保护管理者和政策制定者评估保护地点提供的生态系统服务。该项目将提供有关高地和低地草原生境的生态系统服务及其随时间变化的有价值的信息。我们预计该项目将引起生态学领域的学者以及关注草原栖息地保护和现状的政策制定者的极大兴趣。

Human impacts on the natural environment have reached unprecedented levels. One of the consequences of this has been world-wide declines in biodiversity. However, although many of the services we rely on ecosystems to provide are underpinned by biodiversity we know little about the consequences of biodiversity loss for ecosystem service provision. This project will investigate the extent to which provision in ecosystem services from grassland ecosystems has changed over time focussing on a critical period of human impact, the last fifty years. We will do this by repeating an extensive vegetation survey conducted in the Pennine region, northern England, in 1965. We will also utilise data from a partial resurvey in 1990. The focus of this survey will be calcareous grasslands. This species-rich habitat forms an important part of a multifunctional landscape providing provisioning services through agriculture whilst at the same time being important for supporting, regulating and cultural services. We will revisit sites surveyed in 1965 and record them using the same methods. We will also incorporate results from a repeat of the acid grassland component of the survey which was completed in summer 2012. We will use a range of indicators of stocks and flows of natural capital, some of which we will measure directly such as bee nectar sources (an indicator of the regulating service pollination), and others, such as annual above-ground net primary productivity (an indicator of the supporting service primary productivity), which we will infer using plant traits We will also use out data to contribute to and test ecosystem service indicators in development in the Wessex BESS project. These will be focussed on greenhouse gas fluxes, pollination and natural pest enemies.We will analyse the data collected to examine how provision of ecosystem services has is likely to have changed since 1965 given changes in associated natural capital. We will also collate data on drivers of change during this period such as climate, air pollution and land use intensity. By quantitatively linking drivers and ecological responses we will identify drivers of change in ecosystem service delivery. Using multivariate statistics we will also assess spatial and temporal patterns in the dataset to test the validity of using space-for-time substitutions when assessing ecosystem service delivery. We will use the data generated in this project to create a tool where sites can be plotted passively within an ordination space using data on vegetation species composition to identify the level of ecosystem service delivery. This tool will be useful to conservation managers and policy makers to assess the ecosystem service provision from sites of conservation interest.This project will provide valuable information on ecosystem services in upland and lowland grassland habitats and how they have changed over time. We anticipate the project will be of considerable interest to academics in the field of ecology as well as policy makers concerned with the conservation and status of grassland habitats.