The importance current and historical landscape structure and biodiversity on the provision of ecosystem services in cultural landscapes with high conservation values

(Poster)

Ignacio M. Hernández-Agramonte
ignacio.hernandez@ut.ee

Tartu University, Department of Botany, Estonia
,
Elisabeth Prangel
Tartu University, Department of Botany, Estonia
,
Liis Kasari
Tartu University, Department of Botany, Estonia
,
Aveliina Helm
Tartu University, Department of Botany, Estonia

DOI: 10.17011/conference/eccb2018/108099

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Calcareous semi-natural alvar grasslands in Estonia have lost up to 80% of their area since the 1930s due to changes in human activities and land use. Recently, under the European Union LIFE+ Nature project "Life to alvars", this situation has improved as 1500ha of these semi-natural grasslands have been recovered. These changes over time in landscape structure have strong effects on biodiversity and ecosystem processes, resulting also on profound impacts on the provision of ecosystem services (ES) and human well-being. However, for many ecosystem characteristics, changes in the landscape do not have immediate effects but are manifested after a considerable time-lag. Not considering this differences in the ES responses to changes over time can cause an over or underestimation of the ES supply. We investigated the effects of changing landscape structure on the supply of ES in cultural landscapes with high conservation values. We propose that the presence of time-lags for the supply of ES depends on its link to biodiversity due to intrinsic ecological dynamics.

We studied 41 calcareous grasslands in west Estonia which are part of the "life to alvars" project but have not been yet restored. For each grassland, we calculated the landscape structure (area and connectivity) using historical (1930) and current (2010) land use and vegetation maps. We also assessed three ES with different links to biodiversity. The link to biodiversity was given by the different combination of indicators used to calculate the service. Pollination, with a strong link to biodiversity, was calculated as the average of abundance and richness of wild pollinators (butterflies and bumble bees) previously standardized. Carbon sequestration, with a weak link to biodiversity, was calculated as the standardized amount of soil organic carbon. Soil fertility was assessed using the average of two standardized sets of indicators. One set with a strong link to biodiversity (abundance and richness of soil biodiversity) and another set with a weak link to biodiversity (soil depth, P, K, and soil organic matter content). First, we analysed if the landscape structure had significantly changed over time using generalized linear models. Then, we analysed using boosted tree regressions the relative importance of the historical and the current landscape in the provision of ecosystem services.

Our results show that the landscape has suffered a significant area and connectivity loss since 1930. Regarding the importance of historical and present landscape on the provision of ES, the results show that ES with a weak link to biodiversity could show time-lagged responses as the historical landscape was more important than the current landscape, contrary to what happened to those strongly linked to biodiversity ES. Hence, incorporating the ES link to biodiversity and historical and present landscape when assessing ES provision could prevent potential misestimations of ES.

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INTRO:
The abstract presents a study of time-lags in ecosystem services' (ES) response to landscape structure in Estonian grasslands, comparing the effect of current versus historical habitat area and connectivity on several ES.
MERITS:
This is a valuable contribution to the field of ES and landscape ecology research since ecological time lags in general, and time lags in ES in particular, are still poorly understood.
CRITIQUE:
The abstract does not mention how many grassland/landscapes have been surveyed, which historical data were considered and which ES were measured. This makes it harder to assess the validity of the conclusions.
DISCUSSION:
This study has the potential to represent a valuable contribution to the field of ES and landscape ecology research if it is based on a sufficently solid dataset. Improving the language in several places could help conveying a clearer message on the role of spatiotemporal lags in ecosystem services provision.

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INTRO:
The authors analyse the importance of current and historical landscape structure and biodiversity on the provision of ecosystem services from grasslands in Estonia.
MERITS:
Main interest is that the approach analyses the importance of time lags between changing landscape structure and the supply of ES.
CRITIQUE:
An indication of the ecosystem services analysed would provide added value to the text. Indication of the historical time range would also help.
DISCUSSION:
Potential interesting approach, looking forward to see more details.

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INTRO:
The authors present an analysis of the importance of historical and current landscapes, expressed as habitat area and connectivity in the provision of ecosystem services and support to biodiversity.

MERITS:
Tackling the link between changes at the landscape level and respective provision of ecosystem services and support to biodiversity is a step forward to understand how land-use changes may further impact nature conservation and human well-being in the future.
CRITIQUE:
Not clear the relation between the referred Life project and the results presented in the manuscript. Was the analysis and results derived from the project and focused on such landscapes?
DISCUSSION:
Overall, this manuscript may have important implications regarding current knowledge on how recent changes at the landscape level may have a negative impact not only on biodiversity but also on the wide provision of ecosystem services, essential to maintain social-ecological sustainability of cultural landscapes in the future.

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INTRO:
The manuscript describes how changes in the landscape structure affects the supply of ecosystem services in cultural lanscapes, and particularly that of the alvar grasslands in Estonia.

The authors highlight that when changes in the landscape occur the efect on biodiversity and ecosysmte processes is not immediate but usually manifested after a considerable time-lag. It is hypothesized that time-lags are dependent on the link with biodiversity due to ecological dynamics.
MERITS:
The alvar grasslands are a unique ecosystem and their recent restoration process is a great opportunity to analyse changes in biodiverstiy and ecosystem services over time.
CRITIQUE:
The authors have chosen a great area of study, however they fail to introduce it properly in the beginning of their abstract. The alvar grasslands might not be known for several readers, and they have several peculiarities, so I advice to add 2-3 lines explaining what are the alvar grasslands and some characteristics.

The authors didn't explain how exactly are they assessing the provision of ecosystem services, nor how did they measure or estimate the link between landscape structure with provision of ecosystem services. Please give some words or reference to how the provision of ecosystem services and their link with landscape structure was assessed.
DISCUSSION:
The idea of the manuscript is of relevance for the conference and has potential to provide insight on how landscape structure and biodiversity influence ecosystem processes and services. However, the authors should strengthen:

a) their explanation of how the results were acquired and

b) also was the link between ecosystems services and biodiversity measured

The importance current and historical landscape structure and biodiversity on the provision of ecosystem services in cultural landscapes with high conservation values