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Akujärvi A., Hallikainen V., Hyppönen M., Mattila E., Mikkola K., Rautio P. (2014). Effects of reindeer grazing and forestry on ground lichens in Finnish Lapland. Silva Fennica vol. 48 no. 3 article id 1153. 18 p. Highlights• Both reindeer grazing and forestry affect the cover and biomass of reindeer lichens.• Reindeer grazing has bigger impact than forestry.• The lichen cover was about five-fold and the biomass about fifteen-fold in the ungrazed (fenced) sites than in the grazed ones.• The decrease of not only the biomass, but also the cover of lichens, is alarming. AbstractReindeer husbandry and forestry are practiced in the same areas in northern Fennoscandia. Reindeer pastures have largely deteriorated. We aimed to quantify the separate and combined effects of reindeer grazing and forestry on the amount of ground lichens. To do this, we mapped and inventoried all larger enclosures (49) in Finnish Lapland where forest management practices were similar in both sides of the fence. The average time since fencing was 43 years. We recorded the cover and estimated dry biomass of ground lichens, as well as parameters describing forest stand characteristics. The effect of reindeer grazing on both the cover and estimated dry biomass of lichens was clear: in the ungrazed (fenced) sites, the lichen cover (35.8%) was on average 5.3-fold and the dry biomass (1929 kg ha -1 ) 14.8-fold compared with the corresponding estimates in the grazed sites (6.8% and 130 kg ha -1 ). The effect of forestry on lichens was smaller. In the grazed stands the cover and biomass of lichens were higher in the mature stands compared to the younger stand development classes, whereas in the ungrazed stands there were no significant differences between the development classes. Both reindeer grazing and forestry affect the cover and biomass of ground lichens. The influence of reindeer grazing is, however, much heavier than that of forestry. The decrease of not only the biomass, but also the lichen cover, is alarming. The decrease of lichen cover may hinder the recovery of reindeer pastures, which in the long run endangers the sustainability of reindeer husbandry.

Large carnivorous mammals, such as the gray wolf (Canis lupus) have been recently expanding to human-dominated landscapes in many regions. Although wolves tend to avoid human infrastructure, visitations close to human residences might be unavoidable in territories that are highly fragmented by residential areas. House yard visits are of particular concern: according to Finnish legislation, wolves that repeatedly approach within 150 m from the nearest residential building can legally be killed for human safety. We analyzed the average distance from house yards and probability of house yard visitations by wolves against sex, age class, time of day, season and house density for 25 territorial GPS-tracked wolves in Finland. Generally, wolves avoid houseswith mean distances higher than from random locations in the territory. This difference became higher with decreasing house density for sub-adults whilst for adults this difference decreased slightly with decreasing house density. Probability of visitation in house-yards increased with increasing house densities, was far higher at night than in the daytime, a difference that was greater with increasing house density. Sub-adults visited house-yards more often than adult wolves in the first summer after spring dispersal from the natal pack to a territory, but there was no difference in

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Forestry, as a large industry, has significant impacts on the quality of nature-based tourism landscapes in boreal forests. In Finland, the rapid growth of nature-based tourism has expanded outdoor recreation activities from protected areas into timber production forests; this is particularly so in northern Finland. This paper focuses on assessing balanced local net impacts of three alternative land-use scenarios, in which the level of integration between nature-based tourism (NBT) and traditional forestry is varied. The study is located in northern Finland in the area between two top-rated tourist resorts, Ylläs and Levi. The results of the case study support the idea of an eligible integration between NBT and forestry, which takes into account scenic qualities of forested landscapes by restricting traditional management practices. In our case, the increased number of tourists (due to a more attractive forest environment) offset the losses accrued in forestry (due to restricted forest management).