Browsing by Author "Young, Dylan"
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Item Open Access Resilience and degradation in a tropical wetland overgrazed by cattle(2014-04-10T00:00:00Z) Santos, Sandra A.; Perotto-Baldivieso, Humberto L.; Young, DylanINTRODUCTION: The Pantanal, one of the largest wetlands in the world, has a great diversity of flora and fauna. The dynamic hydrological regime, combined with heterogeneous to-pography, has resulted in a mosaic of diverse habitat types in terms of species and physical structure. Due to the abundance of forage resources, the Pantanal flood-plains are important for beef cattle production. Cattle prefer grazing near water bodies because these areas have high quality forage as a result of flooding regimes (Santos et al. 2002). Many wetlands go through a wet/dry cycle that is essential to maintain their produc-tivity and function. In drier years, wetland drawdown provides optimal conditions for a diverse range of forage species, and cattle can graze continuously, leading to pasture degradation. It is therefore essential to under-stand the spatial and temporal dynamics of forage production and consumption. In this study we assessed and monitored vegetation at the edge of one of the pond habitats intensively grazed by cattle, in order to evaluate degradation and quantify indicators of resilience (Briske et al. 2006).Item Open Access The three-peat challenge: business as usual, responsible agriculture, and conservation and restoration as management trajectories in global peatlands(Taylor and Francis, 2023-11-01) Girkin, Nicholas T.; Burgess, Paul J.; Cole, Lydia; Cooper, Hannah; Coronado, Euridice Honorio; Davidson, Scott J.; Hannam, Jacqueline; Harris, Jim A.; Holman, Ian P.; McCloskey, Christopher S.; McKeown, Michelle M.; Milner, Alice M.; Page, Susan; Smith, Jo; Young, DylanPeatlands are a globally important carbon store, but peatland ecosystems from high latitudes to the tropics are highly degraded due to increasingly intensive anthropogenic activity, making them significant greenhouse gas (GHG) sources. Peatland restoration and conservation have been proposed as a nature-based solution to climate change, by restoring the function of peatlands as a net carbon sink, but this may have implications for many local communities who rely on income from activities associated with transformed peatlands, particularly those drained for agriculture. However, without changing the way that humans interact with and exploit peatlands in most regions, peatlands will continue to degrade and be lost. We propose that there are ultimately three potential trajectories for peatland management: business as usual, whereby peatland carbon sink capacity continues to be eroded, responsible agricultural management (with the potential to mitigate emissions, but unlikely to restore peatlands as a net carbon sink), and restoration and conservation. We term this the three-peat challenge, and propose it as a means to view the benefits of restoring peatlands for the environment, as well as the implications of such transitions for communities who rely on ecosystem services (particularly provisioning) from degraded peatlands, and the consequences arising from a lack of action. Ultimately, decisions regarding which trajectories peatlands in given localities will follow torequire principles of equitable decision-making, and support to ensure just transitions, particularly for communities who rely on peatland ecosystems to support their livelihoods.