Small wetlands are often ignored in inventory studies; consequently they are less protected and therefore more vulnerable. Moreover, previous research indicates the importance of small wetlands as they can provide important ecosystem services to human kind. The Environmental Protection Agency of Sweden has carried out a national wetland inventory, however they have applied a limited area, which consequently excludes smaller wetlands. This study aims to make an inventory of the excluded wetlands smaller than 10 hectares in Laholms municipality, Halland. In this inventory study I have applied GIS as a method by comparing different map layers, such as aerial photos, land cover data and Google Earth. Furthermore, the study aims to investigate the ecosystem services provided by the located wetlands in the study area and discuss how this exclusion could affect the services. The results of the inventory indicate that 745 wetlands are missing in the Environmental Protection Agency inventory, which correspond to 12 percent of the total wetlands in Laholms municipality. The results also indicate that 99,1 percent of the missing wetlands are mire and 0,9 percent are riparian wetlands. In the literature study I found that mire provides ecosystem services such as carbon storage, material such as peat, and unique habitats for biodiversity. Riparian wetlands provide ecosystem services such as unique habitats for biodiversity, improving the quality of the water, reduce fertilization and provide recreational values. Moreover, both type of wetlands are also important to the wetland mosaic in order to maintain proliferation and the local hydrological systems. Additionally, small wetlands are especially important to invertebrates and amphibians. Though, if the small wetlands in Laholms municipality continue to be ignored then the benefits of the ecosystem services mentioned above are likely to be reduced and limited.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:UPSALLA1/oai:DiVA.org:su-101304 |
| Date | January 2014 |
| Creators | Kindström, Marie |
| Publisher | Stockholms universitet, Institutionen för naturgeografi och kvartärgeologi (INK) |
| Source Sets | DiVA Archive at Upsalla University |
| Language | Swedish |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Student thesis, info:eu-repo/semantics/bachelorThesis, text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Rights | info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess |
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