Transcript Chris Robinson - Peak District National Park

Welcome to the Peak District
National Park
Moorlands as Indicators of Climate Change Initiative
Welcome to MICCI
This is a project designed for schools to investigate
the interrelationship between the moorland
landscape and climate change
Chris Robinson Learning and Discovery Officer PDNPA
So What is ‘Moorland’?
Moorland Ecology
Characteristics and Types
WINDY & WET:
>1000mm/year
Vegetation
Peat
HEIGHT:
>250m above
sea level
SOIL: Peat up
to 4m thick
Gritstone
bedrock
All types have
impoverished
flora
Harsh physical
conditions
Poor soil
structure and
nutrient status
1. Heather moorland - most common, on gentler, relatively
dry slopes
2. Grass moorland - coarse grasses such as mat grass,
wet areas, peat <20cm allowing grass roots to penetrate
3. Cotton grass moorland - rare, wet areas, peat >70cm
4. Sphagnum bog - formerly 18 species, but pollution has
reduced these to 3, of which only 1 is common. Very wet
and acid. An absorbent, spongy mass. Note that 13% of
world’s blanket bog is in UK
Climate Change – it’s definitely happening!
“The warming of the climate is unequivocal”
IPCC report 2007(Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change)
Where do moorlands fit into the climate change debate?
1. Peatlands are the single largest carbon reserve in the UK
(3 billion tonnes of carbon) More carbon is stored in UK
peat than in the forests of the UK and France combined.
2. A good peat bog actively “sequesters” carbon (locks it
away) . Is a “CARBON SINK”
3. A damaged peat bog actively loses carbon to the
atmosphere.(through erosion and oxidation).
Is a “CARBON SOURCE”
4. The warmer and drier the climate is the more erosion and
fires there are. The more carbon turns into CO2.
The Moorland Carbon Cycle
Photosynthesis
Rain
Decomposition
Fluvial Flux (removed by water)
Dissolved Organic Carbon DOC
Peat
Particulate Organic Carbon POC
Dissolved Inorganic Carbon DIC
Weathering of bedrock
CO2 INPUTS
CO2 OUTPUTS
A healthy moor
Carbon flux prediction models (Dark Peak area)
Best case scenario
Worst case scenario
= Carbon loss
= Carbon sink
Source: Sea-viewing Wide
Field-of-View Sensor
(SeaWiFS) Project, NASAGSFC, and ORBIMAGE,
18 April 2003
Satellite view of Northern Britain
Fire on Bleaklow
Fire can turn a healthy moor into an unhealthy one!
Aerial view of fire damage and subsequent erosion on Bleaklow
It’s not all bad though!
Large area
of bare peat
The Moors for the Future partnership have managed
to reseed this area of erosion on Sykes Moor
and many others
GPS position - Garmin
Altitude - Garmin
Aspect - Compass
Elevation
Grid reference
Gradient – Clinometer + tape measure + 2 metre rules
Total length of soil spike
Soil depth – soil spike
Soil temperature - thermometer
length of soil spike
above ground
Dip well for gauging water table
Kitchen waste pipe
Surface of Peat
Measure this!
Holes toto
letlet
water
Holes
water in
in
Metre rule
1 metre
5 cm
Nitrate level – nitrate kit
DOC – water bottle
1
2
3
Temperature – pH meter
pH – pH meter
On/off switch
Protective cover
Soil pH – auger and pH kit
Vegetation record - quadrats
Quadrats
Heather
Bilberry
Crowberry
1
lll
lllll
ll
2
ll
l
3
4
5
l
l
l
l
1 plant, 1 tally mark
2 different plants, 2 tally marks
How do we record and share the results?
Who else is involved?
Carlton High
West Hill
Honley High
Longley Park
Glossopdale
King Ecgberts
Chapel High
Painsley
Catholic College
St John Houghton
Heanorgate
Long Eaton
What sort of conservation work will our experiments inform?
Discoveries you make about the state of the peat will help
scientists from Moors for the Future decide on the most
appropriate conservation methods for the moorland.
Youth Rangers using Geojute fabric to stabilise planting