Wetland environments are amongst the most dynamic landscape types in Europe, experiencing change from climatic, demographic, economic and political influences. They have also been an area of human utilisation and exploitation for millennia, resulting in an incredible richness and diversity of tangible and intangible heritage. Wetlands across Europe, and around the world, are actively undergoing rapid change and development, but there are no tailor-made or proactive studies to identify the impacts of change on the heritage contained within wetlands. The proposed project focusses on key wetland environments in Ireland, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom to act as test cases for the identification of active and passive changes in those regions, and to identify ways in which the heritage of wetlands can contribute to contemporary social challenges. Through a combination of ethnographic survey, literature review, map regression analysis, remote survey and public and stakeholder interaction, the research will identify changing perceptions of wetland heritage, changing attitudes towards wetland utilization, and changing physical conditions within the environments which may influence the longer term survival of wetland heritage. Recent years have seen the potential role of wetlands as valuable ecoservices systems in terms of water management, flood alleviation, and carbon sequestration. This drive can often occur in direct conflict with local populace perceptions of heritage and access to wetland resources. Negotiating and reconciling the rights and perceptions of the local, national and international populace is one of the key aspects that will be addressed within the proposed research programme.

European peatlands have historically formed in cool and wet conditions. The organic matter that is built up by plants every year is not degraded completely, and this means that, over time, the partly degraded organic matter has accumulated as peat with huge quantities of carbon locked away. In their natural state, peatlands areas continue to lock away carbon. We call such areas 'carbon sinks' and through this process, peatlands moderate the Earth's climate. However, around the world, peatlands have been impacted by human activities such as drainage, use as cropland or production forests, burning, and over-grazing. In most of these cases, the rate at which the plants build organic matter and the rate at which it is degraded changes such areas to switch from being a net carbon sink to a net source. In the UK and across Europe, as much as 80% of former peatlands have been damaged in some way. Such areas no longer look like peatlands, but the peat underneath the current land use still behaves differently to other soil types. Greenhouse gases (GHGs) such as carbon dioxide and methane released back to the atmosphere by disturbed peatlands amplify climate change in the same way as burning fossil fuels. Drainage and land use conversion can also alter the flow of water within and from these soils. It is only in hindsight that we have started to recognise how important it is to manage peatlands sustainably. Over the last decade or so, peatland restoration has been used as a tool to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from damaged peatlands, with >£20 mi spent in the UK alone. Unfortunately, the current projected impacts of climate change include more frequent drought spells and, alongside this, an increased risk of wildfire. A major wildfire occurred in May 2019 that affected >60 km2 of peatland in the Flow Country in the far north of Scotland. This fire was extinguished within 50 m of an existing research station that has been monitoring greenhouse gas emissions on an area where restoration activities had recently occurred. The proximity of the fire damage offers us the opportunity to compare the greenhouse gas emissions of carbon dioxide and methane on burned and unburned areas that have otherwise had identical histories of land management and are on similar slopes, aspect and peat depths. The equipment we are using also monitors a range of weather variables such as the amount of sunlight and rainfall, as well as how much of that sunlight ends up heating the soil or how rainfall and evapotransporation losses affect the water table. Therefore, by monitoring what happens to greenhouse gas emissions in burned relative to unburned sites, we will be able to measure whether burning has lasting impacts on greenhouse gas emissions (lowering the mitigation potential such sites have to offer) and whether they are more or less resilient to further fires. We therefore expect that this type of information will be of major benefit to those with an interest in the greenhouse gas mitigation potential of peatland restoration as a policy tool, or as a carbon offsetting mechanism. We also expect that the outputs created by this project will be of interest to the community interested in impacts of climate change and wildfire risk.

A large and significant mortality event in elephants (Loxodonta africana) has developed in the Okavango Delta in Botswana, with 359 elephants found reported dead to date. Investigations are hampered by the rarity of such an event, remote and inaccessible terrain, lack of local capacity for pathology and laboratory diagnosis, and difficulties accessing international support due to covid-19. Despite laboratory testing, the cause remains unknown. This, and experience from other mortality events in ungulates, suggests that multiple interacting factors might be involved, requiring integrated multidisciplinary investigation. There is an urgent need to instigate this research while evidence remains accessible in the field, and to determine implications for this and other elephant populations. The event further provides an opportunity to better understand die-off events in wildlife, which seem to be increasing in frequency and could be linked to environmental change. Botswana hosts the world's largest and expanding population of African elephants, which are under severe hunting pressure in surrounding countries. While specific infectious diseases have caused clusters of mortality in African elephants previously, large scale die-offs from disease are highly unusual, and are of concern given their vulnerable conservation status and role as a keystone species ecologically. Elephants are an integral part of the Okavango Delta ecosystem and play a pivotal role in its biodiversity, stability and functioning, such that a significant decrease in elephant numbers may have a detrimental effect on Botswana's economy. Moreover, similar mortality in smaller vulnerable elephant populations elsewhere could have larger consequences for population viability and it is important to work out the cause of the die-offs and the involvement of environmental factors. The emergence of disease in this shared use area is also of great concern for livestock-dependent communities and potentially for public health, given increasing appreciation of the role of pathogen host-switching in driving disease threats in people. In this project a multidisciplinary team of scientists from Botswana and the UK will work together to undertake urgent field and laboratory investigations while evidence is still available, to determine the cause of the die-off. To help achieve this in such a challenging landscape, we will use advanced molecular biology methods to sample invertebrate (mosquito and tick) vectors, and bioanalysis to detect traces of toxins in environmental samples. Importantly, existing evidence including the location and timing of deaths will be compiled and assessed by an international network of experts to assist the Botswana government in their interpretation. A spatial model will evaluate the relative likelihood of environmental and infectious factors and their interaction. The capacity of partner laboratories in Botswana, and field workers, to investigate future events like this in the globally important Okavango ecosystem will be enhanced by this collaboration and by setting up new analyses there. Government, conservation organisations, local communities and other interested parties in Botswana and internationally will be engaged in the research throughout and come together in a stakeholder forum at the end of the project to discuss outcomes and plan for future responses to wildlife die-offs as well as engaged research in wildlife health in the area using a One Health perspective.

In good condition, peatlands are the most efficient carbon store of all soils. They regulate freshwater supply (peatlands are 95% water) and quality, mitigate climate change by storing greenhouse gases, and maintain biodiversity. Land use management interventions (e.g. use of peat for agriculture, drainage, forestry, burning for game management and recreation) can compromise the delivery of all these services by destabilising the vast carbon store that peat has locked away over thousands of years. The UK has 2 Mha of peatlands (10% land area), however, up to 80% of these peatlands are damaged to some degree. It is estimated that degraded UK peatlands emit 10 Mt C a-1, a similar magnitude to oil refineries or landfill sites, placing the UK among the top 20 countries for emissions of carbon from degrading peat. Restoring degraded peatlands to halt carbon losses is an essential part of a global strategy to fight climate change. However, to date, we do not have a tool to help us assess how land use affects peatland condition in a cost effective manner over large and often remote areas, making it difficult to identify which areas should be prioritised for management intervention. In the UK, several millions of pounds of public money have already been invested in large-scale peatland restoration projects yet we do not have a reliable and robust way to evaluate the effectiveness of restoration. These are important gaps in our knowledge that prevent us from being able to make cost-effective choices when it comes to peatland management With this project, we will develop new statistical methods to detect change in the condition of peatland landscapes from data collected by satellites. In a previous research project, we showed that peatland condition can be found from satellite data that measures surface motion of the peat. A wet peat in good condition displays very different characteristics to dry peat in poor condition. However, our satellite-based approach produces too much complex data that cannot be reliably and consistently analysed by eye. We aim to inform peatland management decisions by developing a new statistical method that can robustly and consistently quantify the changes in the peatland landscape from the satellite data. This requires methods capable of handling extremely large and complex structured datasets. In statistics, a new framework, known as Object-Oriented Data Analysis (OODA), is ideally suited to achieve this purpose by building models based on suitable choices of data objects. OODA can be used for developing parsimonious models for detecting change, and for quantifying uncertainty in predictions. OODA of the satellite data as functions of space and time will enable the modelling of trends and variability in the different regions, and the detection of reg change in the peatland. Our project will develop the OODA method further than its current capabilities and apply this method to the satellite datasets of peat surface motion. The result will be a series of maps that illustrate the change in peatland landscape over time that are designed to be used by land managers and policy makers to guide decision making. This will help reduce unnecessary spending and prioritise the most urgent and strategic areas for peat restoration. Our novel approach combining state-of-the-art statistical methods with satellite data will provide a reliable tool to evaluate investments in peat restoration and report to funding bodies. The ability to quantify changes in the peat landscape using statistics should provide confidence to peatland managers and to those who fund and invest in peatland restoration, enabling them to make better choices for peatlands.

Natural flood risk management (NFM) describes methods of modifying hillslope and catchment runoff through the modification of landscapes to restore natural hydrological behaviour which limits downstream flood risk. This proposal is for a focussed study of NFM benefits associated with wider ecosystem restoration work which is under way across the uplands of the UK. Headwaters comprise 60-80% of the length of most river systems and high slopes and high rainfall mean that they are important areas of hillslope runoff production. Across the UK there are communities which are prone to flash flooding from steep upland catchments. These headwater catchments are relatively small catchments and are areas where extensive upland restoration is occurring and so they are locations where positive impacts of NFM measures are likely to be observed. Vulnerable communities in headwaters are often small and dispersed with land values that rarely justify hard engineering flood defences through standard cost-benefit approaches. If relatively low cost upland restoration approaches can mitigate risk to communities such as this then it will be possible to provide some protection to communities where funding precludes hard engineering approaches. This project will work with project partners Moors for the Future and Greater Manchester, Merseyside and Cheshire Environment Agency who have existing funded NFM work in the southern Pennines to undertake a series of field experiments. These will assess the potential impact of various forms of gully blocking, restoration of Sphagnum cover on moorlands, and establishment of upland woodlands on hillslope runoff production and channel flow. It will also assess the longer term evolution of woodland and gully blocking approaches through the study of mature woodland and well established gully blocked systems. This is an important consideration since investment in NFM works requires confidence in the long term impact of the restoration on runoff and knowledge of any ongoing maintenance costs for the interventions. Installation of NFM schemes to mitigate flood risk requires careful planning and prediction of potential impacts. This project will develop conceptually sophisticated but computationally simple models which can run multiple scenarios in order to assess the catchment wide impacts on runoff of NFM measures implemented to a variety of designs and in a variety of spatial configurations. The model will be developed (with input from project partner CH2M and input from potential users such as EA) and validated using data from the Glossop Brook catchment in Derbyshire which has a history of major flash flooding impacting households in the town of Glossop. The modelling approach will then be used to assess possible NFM interventions in the upland catchments draining to 21 communities at risk on the eastern edge of Greater Manchester. In each of these catchments we will model the optimum configuration of upland restoration measures for NFM benefit. The project will also work with partners (Environment Agency, Natural Resources Wales, Scottish Environmental Protection Agency, International Union the Conservation for Nature) to identify existing headwater flow records across the UK which relate to areas of significant upland restoration. At these sites we will model expected impacts and interrogate the available flow data for evidence of these effects on runoff. The project will work with its range of project partners which span England, Wales and Scotland and which comprise regulators, land managers and industry to develop guidelines to optimise future implementation of NFM measures in headwater catchments across upland Britain.