Evaluation of the Success of Mountain Blanket Bog Pool Restoration in Terms of Aquatic Macroinvertebrates

Hannigan, Edel; Mangan, Rosie; Kelly‐Quinn, Mary

doi:10.3318/bioe.2011.111.08

Cited by 8 publications

(10 citation statements)

References 29 publications

(41 reference statements)

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…Almost no dragonflies are found in degraded, dry, and shaded peatlands, while they immediately colonize rewetted sites with unshaded water bodies (Elo et al ) as created by peat extraction for dam building. This confirms previous findings, that showed that bog pools can be successfully restored (Mazerolle et al ; Hannigan et al ; Brown et al ). Furthermore, our results showed that deeper pools have higher dragonfly richness, including characteristic peatland species.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 92%

Positive trends in plant, dragonfly, and butterfly diversity of rewetted montane peatlands

Strobl

Moning

Kollmann

2019

Restoration Ecology

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Drainage and afforestation of peatlands cause extensive habitat degradation and species losses. Restoration supports peatland biodiversity by creating suitable habitat conditions, including stable high water tables. However, colonization by characteristic species can take decades or even fail. Peatland recovery is often monitored shortly after restoration, but initial trends may not continue, and results might differ among taxonomic groups. This study analyzes trends in plant, dragonfly, and butterfly diversity within 18 years after rewetting of montane peatlands in central Germany. We compared diversity and species composition of 19 restored sites with three drained peatlands and one near‐natural reference site. Restoration resulted in improved habitat conditions and benefited species diversity, but there were marked differences among taxonomic groups. Dragonflies rapidly colonized small water bodies but their diversity did not further increase in older restoration sites. Characteristic peatland vegetation recovered slowly, since it depended on a high water holding capacity that was only reached after peat started accumulating. Generally, plant diversity developed toward reference conditions albeit incompletely, even 18 years after restoration. Butterflies responded less to peatland restoration; generalists increased only temporarily and specialists could not establish. In conclusion, peatland restoration improves habitat conditions and biodiversity, while trajectories of recovery are nonlinear and incomplete after two decades. This highlights the need for long‐term monitoring and a strategic selection of indicator species for evaluation of restoration success.

show abstract

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 92%

Positive trends in plant, dragonfly, and butterfly diversity of rewetted montane peatlands

Strobl

Moning

Kollmann

2019

Restoration Ecology

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…It presents baseline macroinvertebrate community data on the reference condition for a range of peatland types. This will be useful for future work to select indicator species of state and impact, in terms of habitat integrity, biodiversity and success of rehabilitation efforts (Hannigan et al, 2011). To achieve this, further sampling is required along a gradient of degradation, in combination with more intensive temporal sampling.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 98%

Composition and structure of macroinvertebrate communities in contrasting open-water habitats in Irish peatlands: implications for biodiversity conservation

Hannigan

Kelly‐Quinn

2012

Hydrobiologia

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The purpose of this study was to consider the relative importance of several habitat variables in explaining the patterns in the structure of macroinvertebrate assemblages in open-water habitats, in relatively intact bogs and fens, which should inform conservation strategies. It was hypothesised that variables relating to the size of the water body would differentiate the communities and that some species would be unique to certain conditions. The macroinvertebrate communities from pools [100 m 2 , 10.1-100 m 2 and Sphagnum hollows were characterised using sweep sampling for eight intact peatland sites across four bog types, and related to habitat variables including pool size, Sphagnum cover and hydrochemistry. Results showed community composition and structure differed significantly between deep, permanent pools and shallow, droughtsensitive Sphagnum hollows, with larger invertebrates, such as Odonates and Dytiscinae, rarely found in the hollows. Sphagnum cover accounted for a substantial amount of the variation in community composition. An examination of life-history strategies found species dependent on predictable conditions for juvenile development to be more abundant in pools. In contrast, taxa that could delay juvenile development until conditions were favourable were more abundant in Sphagnum hollows. These results highlight the importance of habitat heterogeneity in maintaining macroinvertebrate diversity in peatlands.

show abstract

“…Ditch blocking is thus unlikely to lead to either positive or negative changes in the treatability of potable water at our site. Although the lack of improved treatability may prove disappointing to water utilities, the null result can also be perceived as a "no regrets" outcome if other benefits can be obtained from ditch-blocking, for example, reducing peak flows (Ballard, McIintyre, & Wheater, 2012), reducing sediment loss (Holden, Gascoign, & Bosanko, 2007), improving biodiversity (Carroll et al, 2011;Hannigan, Mangan, & Kelly-Quinn, 2011), restoring bog vegetation (Bellamy, Stephen, Maclean, & Grant, 2012), and improving landscape aesthetics (Bonn et al, 2014), without concern that these aims will interfere with potable water supplies.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Peatland ditch blocking has no effect on dissolved organic matter (DOM) quality

Peacock

Jones

Futter

et al. 2018

Hydrological Processes

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The globally widespread drainage of peatlands has often been shown to lead to increased concentrations and fluxes of dissolved organic carbon (DOC) in streams and rivers. Elevated DOC concentrations have implications for carbon cycling, ecosystem functioning, and potable water treatment. Peatland rewetting, principally through ditch blocking, is often carried out with the expectation that this will reduce DOC concentrations. Uncertainty still remains as to whether drainage, or its reversal via ditch blocking, will also lead to changes in the molecular composition of DOC/dissolved organic matter (DOM), which have the potential to affect downstream processing and treatability of U.K. drinking water supplies. To investigate this question, we used a replicated experiment consisting of 12 parallel ditches on an upland bog and took samples of ditch water, pore water, and overland flow water for 4 years. After a brief preblocking baseline period, eight ditches were blocked using two methods. A complementary suite of optical metrics, chemical measurements, and analytical techniques revealed that ditch blocking had no consistent effect on DOM quality, up to 4 years after blocking. Where significant differences were found, effect size calculations demonstrated that these differences were small and would therefore have minimal impact upon water treatability. Furthermore, some differences between ditches were evident before blocking took place, highlighting the need for robust baseline monitoring before intervention. Based on our results from a hillslope‐scale experiment, we were unable to identify clear evidence that peatland ditch blocking will deliver benefits in terms of DOM treatability in potable water supplies, although we also did not find any evidence of short‐term deterioration in water quality during the restoration period. We conclude that, although peatland restoration can be expected to deliver other benefits such as reduced carbon loss and enhanced biodiversity, it is doubtful whether it will lead to improvements in drinking water treatability.

show abstract

Evaluation of the Success of Mountain Blanket Bog Pool Restoration in Terms of Aquatic Macroinvertebrates

Cited by 8 publications

References 29 publications

Positive trends in plant, dragonfly, and butterfly diversity of rewetted montane peatlands

Positive trends in plant, dragonfly, and butterfly diversity of rewetted montane peatlands

Composition and structure of macroinvertebrate communities in contrasting open-water habitats in Irish peatlands: implications for biodiversity conservation

Peatland ditch blocking has no effect on dissolved organic matter (DOM) quality

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About