Understanding recent land-use change in Snowdonia to plan a sustainable future for uplands: integrating palaeoecology and conservation practice

英国的可持续未来取决于对农村景观功能/土地利用和关键生态系统服务状态的整体评估[1]。在英国高地，重要的问题包括实现土地使用的净零碳目标，增加森林面积，在支持高地农业的同时保持或增强生物多样性。规划是更好地了解最近的变化，在高地系统有关的大规模社会和经济转型的世纪。该项目的重点是斯诺登尼亚，北威尔士的山区，包括广泛的斯诺登尼亚国家公园。在这里，人类的一系列影响（例如，砍伐森林、焚烧摩尔、植树造林、放牧压力的波动水平和牧场的改善）影响了植被覆盖的大规模镶嵌以及碳、养分和污染物向高地沃茨和下游地区的输入和输出。过去约150年的土地利用/农业/林业实践与泥炭中碳储存潜力/内陆沃茨质量之间的联系，可以通过应用于泥炭和湖泊沉积记录的现代古生态学技术来证明。这项工作将有助于与威尔士自然资源部（班戈尔）合作制定高地管理战略。

The UK's sustainable future rests on a holistic appraisal of rural landscape function/land use and the state of critical ecosystem services [1]. In upland Britain, important concerns include moving towards net-zero carbon targets for land-use, increasing the forest estate, and maintaining or enhancing biodiversity while supporting upland farming. Planning is better informed by knowledge of recent change in the upland system related to the large-scale social and economic transformations of the 20th Century. This project focuses on Snowdonia, a mountainous region of North Wales that includes the extensive Snowdonia National Park. Here, a range of human impacts (for example, deforestation, moor burning, afforestation, fluctuating levels of grazing pressure, and pasture improvement) have affected the landscape-scale mosaic of vegetation cover and inputs and outputs of carbon, nutrients and pollutants to upland waters and downstream locations. The link between land use/farming/forestry practices of the past ca 150 yr and carbon storage potential in peat/quality of inland waters can be demonstrated using modern palaeoecological techniques applied to peat and lake sedimentary records. The work would contribute to the development of upland land-management strategy in partnership with Natural Resources Wales (Bangor).