Nature without barriers

Transcription

1 Nature without barriers Natura2000 sites as Green Infrastructure in the Austrian-Hungarian transborder region Fertö-Hansag-Neusiedlersee Thomas Wrbka Michael Kuttner Univ. Vienna - Department of Biodiversity & Botany International Workshop on Remote Sensing and GIS for Monitoring of Habitat Quality, Vienna, September

2 Study Aims Assessment of Ecological Functionality of (agri)cultural landscapes, with special emphasis on Central European transboundary regions Identification of Green Infrastructure and investigating the particular role of protected sites (eg. Natura2000) >> operational rapid assessment methods >> proxy indicators for biodiversity in absence of fullcoverage data on species-distribution and habitat-quality

3 Scientific concepts: pattern & process paradigm semi-natural landscape increasing human influence Landscape structure captures frozen energycascades and matterflows ( landscape ecology ) The excessive use of fossil energy creates simple geometry in agricultural landscapes ( fractal geometry ) Landscape elements, landscape types, regions, etc. are part of a hierarchical system ( hierarchy theory ) intensive agriculture

4 Scientific concepts: landscape structure vs. naturalness Relationship between land use intensity / hemerobiotic state and boundary complexity (Moser et al 2002): Boundary complexity (SUM-NSCP) 5000 R 2 = alpine pasture Land use intensity (Avg-Hemeroby) conserved landscape structure but intensive land use Negative corelation between boundary complexity and degree of naturalness can be assessed Cropland and vineyards: rectangular, low NPSC Natural inland salt marshes: irregular, high NPSC Scatterdiagramm of land use intensity (Hemerobiotic state) and landscape complexity (NSCP = Number of Shape Characterstic Points) ; r²=0,51, p<0,01

5 Study Area: Neusiedlersee / Fertö-Hansag Central Europe Transborder regions Variety of landforms Different landscape character types High significance for nature conservation

6 different ecological context! Elevated terrace dominated by cropland Sand & salt lake country Mires, Alder carrs & other wetlands

7 Environmental stratification: main landforms

8 Protected islands surrounded by cropland

9 Stratified randomly selected landscape samples

10 Methodological framework & workflow

11 Landcover maps derived from orthofotointerpretation and fieldmapping

12 Aggregation of LC-types to functional elements

13 Ecological functionality 1. Calculation of landscape metrics for each landscape element 2. Rule-based assessment of indices >>> ecological functionality

14 landscape level: Calculation of landscape metrics» ex.: area-weighted mean Shape Index increases with shape complexity LID LCT PA NP LPI LSI SHAPE_AM TCA (ha) CONTAG CONNECTDIVISION PR SHDI e4830n e4834n e4835n e4837n e4846n e4846n e4849n e4850n e4812n e4847n e4843n e4844n e4837n e4844n e4846n e4819n e4816n e4817n e4808n

15 Example: ENN (Euclidian nearest neighbor) Output values from Fragstats: Transformed metrics: Transformed & normalised: 100 value for negative relation: Arithmetic mean:

16 Assessment rules for landscape metrics Index has positive (+) or negative (-) influence on ecological functionality

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18 Structural Functionality In Different Landscapes 1

19 Structural Functionality In Different Landscapes 2 >>> better structural functionality in landscapes with higher share of forests & wetlands

20 Protected vs.unprotected sites: Example Lake Basin >>> landscape samples with a high share of protected areas have a higher structural functionality

21 Methodological framework & workflow (ctd.)

22 GUIDOS and MSPA Freeware program, written by Peter Vogt at the JRC Based on binary raster maps it allows for several spatial analysis, generating a multithematic output In our case, we only performed the MSPA (Morphological Spatial Pattern Analysis) so far:

23 MSPA: Analysis of ecological networks Specialists are using +/- less disturbed and semi(natural) parts of a landscape as home ranges like forests, natural grasslands, hedges, old fallow land, orchards Edge species appear on the boundaries and transitions between several types of open cultural land categories (e.g. field or grassland margins) as well as on the edges of woodlands and open land.

24 Allocation of travelling costs Average travelling costs were allocated for each single Sample site within the Investigation area To ensure equal conditions for the allocation, a standardized sampling method was undertaken in every sample site:» 1. The centroid of the largest core area was selected as the starting point.» 2. A buffer zone, encompassing a 1km radius was set, originating from the Core area centroid» 3. At the circular line of the buffer -points were set in 15 degree intervals and 7 of them were randomly chosen as end points The actual travelling costs were calculated in ArcView using PATHMATRIX (Ray N. (2005)), a tool to compute effective geographic distances among samples based on least cost path algorithms. After that, the resulting values were transformed and and the mean value for each sample site was calculated

25 Habitat Suitability of Green Infrastructure and Cost Surface mapping (1): * Mean ratio of Core areas and Connectivity; Agricultural dominated matrix; Average Dispersal Costs *

26 Functionality Of Ecological Infrastructure Based On Cost Surface

27 Functionality & Travelling Costs Log. Regression corr. r²=0.729 Quad. Regression corr. r²=0.872 Log. Regression corr. r²=0.677 overall functionality per sample site is strongly depending on areal share of (highly-functional) GI- elements travelling costs of the DSG is also strongly depending on areal share and Functionality of GI-elements

28 Correlation ES Provision / Structural Functionality In addition: Structural functionality is positively corelated with the provision of main ecosystem services, like habitat and provisioning function, regulation etc.

29 Protected vs. Unprotected Areas as Ecological Infrastructure? landscape samples with a high share of protected areas have more and larger core areas & corridors >>> protected areas can be seen as important elements of ecological infrastructure

30 Thank You for Your Attention! References Kuttner, M., Hainz-Renetzeder, C., Hermann, A., Wrbka, Th. (2013): Borders without barriers Structural functionality and green infrastructure in the Austrian Hungarian transboundary region of Lake Neusiedl. Ecological Indicators 31; Hermann, A., Kuttner, M., Hainz- Renetzeder, C., Konkoly-Gyuró, É, Tirászi, Á, Brandenburg, C., Allex, B., Ziener, K., Wrbka, T. (2014): Assessment framework for landscape services in European cultural landscapes: An Austrian Hungarian case study. Ecological Indicators 37;