Mires in Europe—Regional Diversity, Condition and Protection
Abstract
:1. Introduction
2. Materials and Methods
2.1. Definitions
2.2. Peatland Distribution
2.3. Peatland Condition
2.4. Protected Areas
3. Results
3.1. Peatland Cover
3.2. Peatland Condition
3.3. Peatland Protection
3.4. Overview and Key Characteristics of the Ten Mire Regions of Europe
4. Discussion
4.1. Data Quality
4.2. Designation of Protected Areas vs. Peatland Protection
- The most important criteria for identifying mires of international conservation importance are similar to those on a local/national scale. The local criterion ‘representativeness’ identifies ‘rareness’ on an international scale. The local criterion ‘rareness’ normally identifies mire components that on an international scale are either rare, or at the margin of/outside their main distribution area. Such marginal/azonal occurrences are ‘distinctive’ and have a high conservational value [43,44].
- Application of objective selection criteria, and the use of optimally efficient selection strategies indicate that a very large number of protected areas (and a very large area) are necessary to secure biological diversity. In the framework of the climate and biodiversity crisis, the protection of all still-pristine peatlands and the rewetting/restoration of all drained and otherwise degraded peatlands is necessary.
- Management should be guided by nature conservation (natural biodiversity purposes) especially in strictly protected areas, and by provision of other ecosystem services (regulating and provisioning services) in less strictly protected areas (e.g., biosphere reserves) and in the unprotected peatland areas (e.g., enhanced by appropriate agricultural funding schemes).
- For all protected peatlands, it is fundamental to also protect their catchment (see below).
- Different mire types may be functionally connected, for example petrifying springs and spring fens, both protected habitat types under EU law. This implies that restoration of damaged petrifying springs and spring fens should aim at restoring the complexes as a whole with both habitats included, and should not focus solely on the separate habitat types [45].
4.3. Lessons Learnt from Europe
- Peatland conservation implies primarily the conservation of its hydrology. Even small drops of the water level can affect peat accumulation and conservation and initiate ongoing peatland degradation.
- To conserve a peatland, its entire ‘hydrological unit’ has to be conserved, i.e., the entire peat body and—certainly in cases of groundwater fed systems—also the mineral catchment area and hydrological buffer zone.
- If peatlands must be used, they should be used wet [3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12,13,14,15,16,17,18,19,20,21,22,23,24,25,26,27,28,29,30,31,32,33,34,35,36,37,38,39,40,41,42,43,44,45,46,47,48,49]. This recent insight has not yet resulted in large scale implementation of suitable production techniques, because the techniques and rules and modalities still have to be developed, accepted and adapted [50].
Supplementary Materials
Author Contributions
Funding
Institutional Review Board Statement
Informed Consent Statement
Data Availability Statement
Acknowledgments
Conflicts of Interest
References
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Nb. | Mire Region | Mire Massif Type | Total Peatland Area | Degraded Peatlands | Degraded Peatlands excl. European Russia | Degraded Peatlands EU27 Countries Only | Peatlands in Protected Areas | ||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Characteristic | Additional | km2 | % | km2 | % | km2 | % | km2 | % | km2 | % | ||
I | Arctic seepage and polygon mire region | Tundra seepage and polygon fen | Palsa mire; Flat fen & marsh | 62,700 | 6 | 600 | 1 | - | - | - | - | 7100 | 11 |
II | Palsa mire region | Palsa mire | String-flark fen types and mixed mires | 147,100 | 13 | 8700 | 6 | 1900 | 16 | 1400 | 21 | 13,700 | 9 |
III | Northern fen region | String-flark fen types and mixed mires | Rim raised bog; Blanket bog; Plane bog; Percolation fen; Flat fen & marsh | 300,600 | 27 | 57,800 | 26 | 49,700 | 36 | 43,400 | 40 | 39,900 | 13 |
IV | Typical raised bog region | Typical raised bog; Wooded raised bog | Plane bog; Flat fen & marsh | 341,700 | 31 | 88,100 | 26 | 33,400 | 49 | 26,900 | 50 | 34,600 | 10 |
V | Atlantic bog region | Atlantic raised bog; Blanket bog | Plane bog; Flat fen & marsh | 64,200 | 6 | 43,500 | 68 | 43,500 | 68 | 22,800 | 75 | 35,900 | 56 |
VI | Continental fen and bog region | Wooded raised bog | Plane bog; Percolation fen; Flat fen & marsh | 130,900 | 12 | 48,900 | 37 | 20,100 | 58 | 2900 | 63 | 19,700 | 15 |
VII | Nemoral-submeridional fen region | Flat fen & marsh | Plane bog; Percolation fen | 30,600 | 3 | 19,300 | 63 | 19,300 | 63 | 17,500 | 66 | 13,700 | 45 |
VIII | Colchis mire region | Percolation bog | Flat fen & marsh | 600 | <1 | 30 | 5 | 30 | 5 | - | - | 300 | 44 |
IX | Southern European marsh region | Flat fen & marsh | - | 16,000 | 2 | 8500 | 53 | 3800 | 47 | 3500 | 47 | 6800 | 43 |
X | Central and southern European mountain compound region | Flat fen & marsh | Sloping fen; Plane bog; Percolation fen | 4000 | <1 | 1300 | 32 | 1200 | 32 | 1500 | 44 | 2200 | 56 |
Total | - | - | 1,082,400 | 100 | 276,700 | 25 | 172,900 | 48 | 120,000 | 50 | 174,700 | 16 |
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Tanneberger, F.; Moen, A.; Barthelmes, A.; Lewis, E.; Miles, L.; Sirin, A.; Tegetmeyer, C.; Joosten, H. Mires in Europe—Regional Diversity, Condition and Protection. Diversity 2021, 13, 381. https://doi.org/10.3390/d13080381
Tanneberger F, Moen A, Barthelmes A, Lewis E, Miles L, Sirin A, Tegetmeyer C, Joosten H. Mires in Europe—Regional Diversity, Condition and Protection. Diversity. 2021; 13(8):381. https://doi.org/10.3390/d13080381
Chicago/Turabian StyleTanneberger, Franziska, Asbjørn Moen, Alexandra Barthelmes, Edward Lewis, Lera Miles, Andrey Sirin, Cosima Tegetmeyer, and Hans Joosten. 2021. "Mires in Europe—Regional Diversity, Condition and Protection" Diversity 13, no. 8: 381. https://doi.org/10.3390/d13080381