5 research outputs found
Long-term land-cover/use change in a traditional farming landscape in Romania inferred from pollen data, historical maps and satellite images
Traditional farming landscapes in the temperate
zone that have persisted for millennia can be exceptionally species-rich and are therefore key conservation targets. In contrast to Europe’s West, Eastern Europe harbours widespread traditional farming landscapes, but drastic socio-economic and political changes in the twentieth century are likely to have impacted these landscapes profoundly. We reconstructed long-term land-use/cover and biodiversity changes over the last 150 years in a traditional farming landscape of outstanding species diversity in Transylvania. We used the Regional Estimates of Vegetation Abundance from Large Sites model applied to a pollen record from the Transylvanian Plain and a suite of historical and satellite-based maps. We documented widespread changes in the extent and location of grassland and cropland, a loss of wood pastures as well as a gradual increase in forest extent. Land management in the socialist period (1947–1989) led to grassland expansion, but grassland diversity decreased due to intensive production. Land-use intensity has declined since the collapse of socialism in 1989, resulting in widespread cropland abandonment and conversion to grassland. However, these trends may be
temporary due to both ongoing woody encroachment as
well as grassland management intensification in productive areas. Remarkably, only 8% of all grasslands existed throughout the entire time period (1860–2010), highlighting the importance of land-use history when identifying target areas for conservation, given that old-growth grasslands are most valuable in terms of biodiversity. Combining datasets from different disciplines can yield important additional insights into dynamic landscape and biodiversity changes, informing conservation actions to maintain these species-rich landscapes in the longer term
From landscape description to quantification: A new generation of reconstructions provides new perspectives on Holocene regional landscapes of SE Sweden
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Testing the Effect of Relative Pollen Productivity on the REVEALS Model: A Validated Reconstruction of Europe-Wide Holocene Vegetation
Peer reviewed: TrueReliable quantitative vegetation reconstructions for Europe during the Holocene are crucial to improving our understanding of landscape dynamics, making it possible to assess the past effects of environmental variables and land-use change on ecosystems and biodiversity, and mitigating their effects in the future. We present here the most spatially extensive and temporally continuous pollen-based reconstructions of plant cover in Europe (at a spatial resolution of 1° × 1°) over the Holocene (last 11.7 ka BP) using the ‘Regional Estimates of VEgetation Abundance from Large Sites’ (REVEALS) model. This study has three main aims. First, to present the most accurate and reliable generation of REVEALS reconstructions across Europe so far. This has been achieved by including a larger number of pollen records compared to former analyses, in particular from the Mediterranean area. Second, to discuss methodological issues in the quantification of past land cover by using alternative datasets of relative pollen productivities (RPPs), one of the key input parameters of REVEALS, to test model sensitivity. Finally, to validate our reconstructions with the global forest change dataset. The results suggest that the RPPs.st1 (31 taxa) dataset is best suited to producing regional vegetation cover estimates for Europe. These reconstructions offer a long-term perspective providing unique possibilities to explore spatial-temporal changes in past land cover and biodiversity.</jats:p
Recommended from our members
Testing the Effect of Relative Pollen Productivity on the REVEALS Model: A Validated Reconstruction of Europe-Wide Holocene Vegetation
Peer reviewed: TrueReliable quantitative vegetation reconstructions for Europe during the Holocene are crucial to improving our understanding of landscape dynamics, making it possible to assess the past effects of environmental variables and land-use change on ecosystems and biodiversity, and mitigating their effects in the future. We present here the most spatially extensive and temporally continuous pollen-based reconstructions of plant cover in Europe (at a spatial resolution of 1° × 1°) over the Holocene (last 11.7 ka BP) using the ‘Regional Estimates of VEgetation Abundance from Large Sites’ (REVEALS) model. This study has three main aims. First, to present the most accurate and reliable generation of REVEALS reconstructions across Europe so far. This has been achieved by including a larger number of pollen records compared to former analyses, in particular from the Mediterranean area. Second, to discuss methodological issues in the quantification of past land cover by using alternative datasets of relative pollen productivities (RPPs), one of the key input parameters of REVEALS, to test model sensitivity. Finally, to validate our reconstructions with the global forest change dataset. The results suggest that the RPPs.st1 (31 taxa) dataset is best suited to producing regional vegetation cover estimates for Europe. These reconstructions offer a long-term perspective providing unique possibilities to explore spatial-temporal changes in past land cover and biodiversity.</jats:p