SOWAP: Freshwater Biodiversity

The aim of SOWAP's freshwater work in Hungary and the UK is to assess the impacts of conservation tillage on the plants and animals living in still and running waters. We will investigate whether use of conservation tillage improves the water quality and biodiversity of adjacent streams, compared to conventional mouldboard ploughing. Woodland streams will used as a control. All the water-bodies were small, first order streams.

In the UK , the 15 streams (5 of each tillage type and 5 controls) are located in a 100 square km block in the English Midlands between Oxfordshire and Leicestershire. The soils in the catchments are mainly clay loam and typically under a cereal (mainly winter wheat) - winter oilseed rape rotation.

In Hungary nine stream sites will be surveyed. Three sites are located in Middle-Transdanubia, in a 40 km radius circle. The remaining six sites are in north-east Hungary . Sites are located on sandy clay loams or brown forest soils. The crops are wheat or maize. Streams are physically as similar as possible and do not differ significantly in width, depth, flow velocity, shade, pH or water temperature.

Surveys of macro-invertebrates, plants and diatoms and water samples will be taken for nutrient analysis every two months. A research student will answer specific questions about the impact of soil management on stream diatom communities – follow the link and read about the work of Silke Skytte Johanssen

In addition we will examine at Loddington whether buffer-strip ponds intercepting agricultural drains and ditches could bring multiple benefits, both by reducing pollutant levels in run-off and by providing an additional biodiversity resource.

Please follow the links below to find out more about the issues facing water quality and biodiversity (Summary) and the Objectives of this part of the project.