Researchers Dump Tons of Coffee Waste Onto Degraded Land, 2 Years Later It’s Transformed
Researchers have witnessed incredible results after dumping 30 truckloads of coffee pulp, a waste product of the coffee industry, onto an area of degraded former farmland in Costa Rica. Marking out a control area of a similar size, they were astounded by the change over the next two years.
Dr. Rebecca Cole, lead author of the study which was published in the British Ecological Society journal Ecological Solutions and Evidence described the change as “dramatic.”
“The area treated with a thick layer of coffee pulp turned into a small forest in only two years,” Cole said, according to a press release, “while the control plot remained dominated by nonnative pasture grasses.”
Date Time
Tree species diversity is no protection against bark beetle infestation
Ecologist from Freiburg investigates pest infestation in forests with mixed and monoculture tree stands. Their findings are published in
Journal of Ecology.
The Sixtoothed spruce bark beetle mainly attacked native species such as European spruce. Source: Flickr, Peter O’Connor
In recent years, foresters have been able to observe it up close: First, prolonged drought weakens the trees, then bark beetles and other pests attack. While healthy trees keep the invaders away with resin, stressed ones are virtually defenceless.
Freiburg scientist Sylvie Berthelot and her team of researchers from the Faculty of Environment and Natural Resources and the Faculty of Biology are studying the importance of tree diversity on bark beetle infestation. They are investigating whether the composition of tree species affects bark beetle feeding behaviour. The team recently published their findings in the
Freshwater
Freshwater
Freshwater habitats such as rivers and wetlands have high biodiversity, but this is being endangered by climate change, increasing the likelihood of floods and drought due to shifting rainfall patterns.
Professor Chris Spray, the lead author of the Freshwater chapter at the University of Dundee, said: Protecting these endangered habitats would necessitate a wholescape catchment solution that integrates ecological, cultural, and socioeconomic processes. Planting trees along riverbanks, for example, will preserve habitats by providing shelter and building thermal refuges, as well as slowing the flow of water to help mitigate flood risk.
Grasslands
(Photo : Wikimedia Commons)
Grazing grasslands by a diverse range of animals on the same landscape, such as sheep, cattle, horses, goats, and alpacas, will improve grassland sward diversity and greenhouse gas emissions. Emissions can also be reduced by switching from constant grazing to rotational or hybrid
E-Mail
The report offers, for the first time, a complete assessment of the potential of nature-based solutions (NbS) to mitigate climate change and benefit biodiversity in the UK. Incorporating contributions from over 100 experts, the comprehensive evaluation of the available evidence details the strengths, limitations and trade-offs of NbS in different habitats across the UK.
Professor Jane Memmott, President of the British Ecological Society, said: The Nature-based Solutions report offers a real basis for setting effective policies and incentives that will maximise the benefits of nature-based solutions in the UK for the climate and biodiversity.
The report finds that NbS can provide a valuable contribution to climate change mitigation and can simultaneously protect and enhance biodiversity, improve human wellbeing, bring economic benefit, and provide a wide range of ecosystem services.
The UK must ‘learn to love’ its peat bogs as they are carbon storage ‘powerhouses’, an expert said yesterday.
Peatlands in Britain contain around three billion tons of carbon – about three times the amount that forests store – according to a report by the British Ecological Society.
Dr Christian Dunn, of Bangor University, wrote: ‘[Peatlands] are giant security vaults full of carbon but unfortunately these carbon vaults can be broken into, the doors can be blown off and when that happens the carbon is released. We have damaged so much of these carbon vaults.’
Peat is formed by layers of dead moss, which captures carbon as it builds up. Bogs are also an important home to wildlife and provide clean water.