Efficient and sustainable use of floodplains for enhanced productivity

古代林地是指几个世纪以来一直被森林覆盖的林地(英国将树龄超过400年的树木归类为古代林地)。在英国，随着农田和城市开发的增加，这一数字大幅下降。随着城市人口的增加和对房屋建设的主要需求，剩余的古老林地正面临着城市扩张的额外压力。20世纪60年代，随着城市的发展，米尔顿·凯恩斯(Milton Keynes)在开阔的乡村地区建造了一座“新城”，三块古老的林地已经被城市发展所包围，这可能会将它们隔离开来，并使它们面临从当地变暖和干旱到养分沉积增加等环境影响。该项目旨在利用这些地点作为试验区，研究城市化对古老林地的影响，这些影响将与英国和更远地区的这些重要栖息地相关。它将结合从生态学到景观历史和生物地球化学的一系列技术来评估古代林地被纳入城市景观的后果。该项目的一个重要内容是建立固定的监测点，作为长期监测这些城市林地环境变化的基础。最终，它将寻求了解古老的林地能否以及如何在城市扩张的情况下生存下来，并为正在兴起的关于城市化景观中土地节约和土地共享保护方法的辩论提供信息。

Ancient woodlands are those woodlands which have been continuously forested for several centuries (a UK definition classifies woods over 400 years old as ancient). In the UK they have declined dramatically as farmland and urban development have increased. With an increasing urban population and a major demand for housebuilding, remaining ancient woodlands are coming under additional pressure from urban expansion. In Milton Keynes, a 'new town' constructed in the open countryside in the 1960s as the city has grown, three patches of ancient woodland have become surrounded by urban development, potentially isolating them and exposing them to environmental impacts from local warming and drought to increased nutrient deposition. This project aims to use these sites as experimental areas for the study of impacts of urbanisation on ancient woodlands that will have relevance to these important habitats across the UK and further afield. It will combine a range of techniques from ecology to landscape history and biogeochemistry to assess the consequences for ancient woodlands of being incorporated into the urban landscape. An important element of the project is establishing fixed monitoring sites as the foundation for long-term monitoring of environmental change in these urban woodlands. Ultimately it will seek to understand whether and how ancient woodlands can survive in the face of urban expansion and inform the emerging debate about land sparing and land sharing approaches to conservation in urbanising landscapes.