A GEOMORPHOLOGICAL FRAMEWORK & DECISION TOOL FOR HABITAT TRANSLOCATION PRACTICES IN THE UK

Abstract

With the continuing increase in population and growth in per-capita wealth there is ever more land taken for development and use of natural resources. Over the past 30 years this has resulted in significant losses of biodiversity occupying land within developments or resource footprints. Habitat translocation has become a frequently advocated and used technique in the UK, USA, Australia, and elsewhere for mitigating the adverse effects of development, including mining.Three mechanised translocation techniques are frequently used in the UK and the choice can have a bearing on the level of success achieved. Guidance for which to use for a particular site is notably absent leaving the practitioner to decide on commercial or other arbitrary grounds. The objective of this paper is to formulate a Framework and Decision Tool that can be used by planning authorities, regulators, scheme designers and developers to select and evaluate techniques specifically for herbaceous (e.g., grassland, swamp) and dwarf shrub (e.g., heathland) vegetation.There is a long established scientific base on which a Geomorphological Framework and Decision Tool for translocation can be developed. There are comprehensive data sets for landform, soils and climate in published or accessible form for the UK, and guidance that integrates these in a meaningful manner for predicting the safe and efficient cultivation of soils and vegetation by agricultural machines in various landform and soil scenarios.Eight case histories are used to provide evidence that Geo-morphology (landform (gradient) and soil characteristics (profile thickness, stoniness, strength)), with adjustment for climatic (wetness/dryness) is a common factor determining the success of translocation technique, and that established criteria for agricultural machinery can be used as a Framework for a Decision Tool. The tool devised is a simple decision-tree based on a hierarchy of the differentiating criteria of gradient, soil thickness, and soil stoniness and strength.

Microbial community composition of translocated ancient woodland soil: a case study

“…There are few available cases studies of salvage translocation of ancient woodland soil and materials, either because it has rarely been attempted, because monitoring is lacking or studies are not published (Ryan 2013), or because ancient woodland has protected status so alternative routes are probably favored in the planning process. Most of the published research has evaluated the translocation of herbaceous environment such as grassland, wetland or heathland, whose soil and vegetation can more easily be removed by machinery compared to woodland (Bullock 1998;Humphries 2010). The few studies available on the salvage translocation of temperate woodland mostly focused on above-ground vegetation as indicators of the restoration trajectory, either in situ (Helliwell et al 1996;Hietalahti & Buckley 2000;Craig et al 2015;Buckley et al 2017), or ex situ (Craig & Buckley 2013).…”