The impact of peatland drain-blocking on dissolved organic carbon loss and discolouration of water; results from a national survey

Armstrong, Alona; Holden, Joseph; Kay, Paul; Francis, Brian; Foulger, Miles; Gledhill, Sarah; McDonald, Adrian; Walker, Andrew

doi:10.1016/j.jhydrol.2009.11.031

Cited by 93 publications

(88 citation statements)

References 28 publications

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“…This is largely due to a lack of suitable data; most experiments examining the impacts of drain blocking have focused on changes in water table levels (e.g. Armstrong et al, 2010;Price, 2003;Wilson et al, 2010), but even these studies are limited in number. There are also methodological challenges associated with the measurement of flow following drain blocking; cases have been noted where the occurrence of drain flow is reduced by up to as much as 70 % following drain blocking (Worrall et al, 2007a) but this is just within the drainage channels themselves and not necessarily at a location that also measures water that might spill downslope from the blocked drains.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Effects of peatland drainage management on peak flows

Ballard

McIntyre

Wheater

2012

Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci.

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Abstract. Open ditch drainage has historically been a common land management practice in upland blanket peats, particularly in the UK. However, peatland drainage is now generally considered to have adverse effects on the upland environment, including increased peak flows. As a result, drain blocking has become a common management strategy in the UK over recent years, although there is only anecdotal evidence to suggest that this might decrease peak flows. The change in the hydrological regime associated with the drainage of blanket peat and the subsequent blocking of drains is poorly understood, therefore a new physics-based model has been developed that allows the exploration of the associated hydrological processes. A series of simulations is used to explore the response of intact, drained and blocked drain sites at field scales. While drainage is generally found to increase peak flows, the effect of drain blocking appears to be dependent on local conditions, sometimes decreasing and sometimes increasing peak flows. Based on insights from these simulations we identify steep smooth drains as those that would experience the greatest reduction in field-scale peak flows if blocked and recommend that future targeted field studies should be focused on examining surface runoff characteristics.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Effects of peatland drainage management on peak flows

Ballard

McIntyre

Wheater

2012

Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci.

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“…Decreasing sulfur deposition rates allow catchment soils to recover from acidification, where the resulting decrease in acidity and/or ionic strength of the soil solution may increase the solubility of soil organic matter (OM) and consequently OC leaching (4,16,17). Some studies have linked the OC rise to recent changes in land-use practices, such as the drainage and burning of peatlands (18,19), or to changes in land cover (20). Other proposed explanations are the increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide levels (21) and the elevated atmospheric deposition of nitrogen (22,23), both of which support increased plant productivity.…”

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confidence: 99%

Early land use and centennial scale changes in lake-water organic carbon prior to contemporary monitoring

Meyer-Jacob

Tolu

Bigler

et al. 2015

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

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Organic carbon concentrations have increased in surface waters across parts of Europe and North America during the past decades, but the main drivers causing this phenomenon are still debated. A lack of observations beyond the last few decades inhibits a better mechanistic understanding of this process and thus a reliable prediction of future changes. Here we present past lake-water organic carbon trends inferred from sediment records across central Sweden that allow us to assess the observed increase on a centennial to millennial time scale. Our data show the recent increase in lake-water carbon but also that this increase was preceded by a landscape-wide, long-term decrease beginning already A.D. 1450-1600. Geochemical and biological proxies reveal that these dynamics coincided with an intensification of human catchment disturbance that decreased over the past century. Catchment disturbance was driven by the expansion and later cessation of widespread summer forest grazing and farming across central Scandinavia. Our findings demonstrate that early land use strongly affected past organic carbon dynamics and suggest that the influence of historical landscape utilization on contemporary changes in lake-water carbon levels has thus far been underestimated. We propose that past changes in land use are also a strong contributing factor in ongoing organic carbon trends in other regions that underwent similar comprehensive changes due to early cultivation and grazing over centuries to millennia.lake-water quality | carbon cycling | land use | Holocene | paleoecology O ver the past three decades, monitoring programs have recorded a widespread increase of organic carbon (OC) concentrations in surface waters in parts of Europe and North America (1-4). OC in lakes and rivers plays a major role in the global carbon cycle by transporting carbon from terrestrial to freshwater and marine environments (5), determining drinking water quality and associated treatment costs (6), and affecting aquatic ecosystem functioning. In aquatic ecosystems, OC influences energy mobilization, light conditions (7), water acidity (8), as well as the transport of metals and pollutants (9). The widespread occurrence of this increase in surface water OC, also referred to as browning or brownification due to an associated increase in color, suggests that regional rather than local factors are the drivers behind this phenomenon, but at present the underlying mechanisms are still controversial.Several hypotheses have been proposed to explain this recent OC increase, from climate change to changes in anthropogenic forcing such as declining atmospheric acid deposition or alterations in landscape utilization. A number of climate-sensitive mechanisms have been suggested to cause an increase in OC export from the terrestrial to the aquatic environment; for example, increased temperatures enhance decomposition rates in organic-rich soils (10) and promote vegetation cover (11). Changes in the amount and timing of precipitation potentially lead to alteration...

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“…Spatial and temporal variability also influence how degradation features impact upon ecosystem services; for example, some areas may be subject to greater water table drawdown or experience more active erosion. This variability may also explain inconsistency in response to many restoration practices (such as Armstrong et al, 2010). Peatland managers may be able to use this variability to their advantage, by identifying areas that are most impacted by degradation and those which are more likely to respond to restoration.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Restoration of blanket peatlands

Parry

Holden

Chapman

2014

Journal of Environmental Management

111

113

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Abstract:There is concern that ecosystem services provided by blanket peatlands have come under threat due to increasing degradation. Blanket peatlands are subject to a wide range of drivers of degradation and are topographically variable. As a result, many degradation forms can develop, including those resulting from eroding artificial drainage, incising gullies and areas of bare peat. Many degraded blanket peatlands have undergone restoration measures since the turn of the century. However, there has been little formal communication of the techniques used and their success. Using practitioner knowledge and a review of the available literature, this paper discusses the methodologies used for restoring sloping blanket peatlands. It then considers current understanding of the impact of restoration on blanket peatland ecosystem services. There is a paucity of research investigating impacts of several common restoration techniques and much more is needed if informed management decisions are to be made and funding is to be appropriately spent. Where data are available we find that restoration is largely beneficial to many ecosystem services, with improvements being observed in water quality and ecology. However, the same restoration technique does not always result in the same outcomes in all locations. The difference in response is predominantly due to the spatial and temporal heterogeneity inherent in all blanket peatlands. Peatland practitioners must take this variability into account when designing restoration strategies and monitoring impact.

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The impact of peatland drain-blocking on dissolved organic carbon loss and discolouration of water; results from a national survey

Cited by 93 publications

References 28 publications

Effects of peatland drainage management on peak flows

Effects of peatland drainage management on peak flows

Early land use and centennial scale changes in lake-water organic carbon prior to contemporary monitoring

Restoration of blanket peatlands

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