Habitats, Biodiversity and Countryside Management

Managed, not left alone

It is easy to assume that wildlife does best where people stay away, and that conservation means leaving land untouched. On this course that assumption gets in the way. Almost every habitat you will study here is a farmed one, or one that exists because of how land has been used: grassland, hedges, bog and woodland in a working countryside. The species the specification asks you to know are countryside and farmland species. And every measure it lists is something a farmer actively does. So the chain to hold on to runs like this. A habitat is a set of conditions. Farming changes those conditions, for better or worse. What lives on that land therefore follows from how it is managed. That is why designations, incentives and management practices exist at all, and it is why this is an agriculture course rather than a biology one.

The five definitions

Five terms the specification expects you to define. The last two are a pair, and questions often ask you to sort examples into them.

Match the habitat

The word that means the opposite

Here is the single most useful thing on this topic, and it is hidden in a word. Grassland on this course is either improved or unimproved, and improved does not mean better. It means improved for farming: reseeded with productive grasses, fertilised, drained, and cut or grazed hard. That produces far more grass, which is the point. It also produces far fewer plant species, and with fewer plants come fewer insects and fewer of the birds that eat them. Unimproved grassland is the opposite. It yields less and carries more. So the two words describe the same trade running in opposite directions, and if you read improved as simply better you will have the relationship backwards in every question on this section. Everything else in countryside management is about managing that trade rather than pretending it is not there.

Which grassland has more species

A farm has one field of improved grassland and one of unimproved. Which is likely to have higher biodiversity, and why?

• The unimproved field, because it has not been reseeded or heavily fertilised, so more plant species survive in it
• The improved field, because improvement makes conditions better for everything living there
• They will be about the same, because both are grassland
• The improved field, because fertiliser adds nutrients that support more kinds of plant

Countryside facts drill

Five quick questions on the names this section expects you to have exactly. Three lives.

Two designations, two reasons

Northern Ireland uses two designations you need to know, and they protect land for different reasons. The specification names five sites in this context: Lough Neagh, the Foyle Basin, Cranny Bogs, Peatlands Park and the Magilligan sand dunes.

Which practices help

Select the TWO actions that this specification lists as ways a farmer minimises the impact of farming on ecosystems.

• Restoring hedges, which provide habitat and link one area to another
• Minimising soil compaction, so that soil structure and the life in it are not damaged
• Reseeding unimproved grassland to raise its yield
• Removing hedges to create larger and more efficient fields

What the farmer actually does

The measures this section names are all active. Preventing soil _____ keeps the surface layer where it is. Restoring _____ gives species both a home and a route between areas. Reducing the use of _____ limits harm to species the farm was not targeting. And there are reasons beyond goodwill: schemes offer financial _____ for managing land this way, and land managed well can also support public _____.

How to study a habitat

Put the stages of a habitat study in order. This is about what you measure and record in a habitat, not about how a plan is written.

• Identify the habitat and what makes it distinct from the land around it
• Measure the abiotic factors, such as light, soil pH and how wet the ground is
• Sample the living things present, in the same way at each point so results can be compared
• Record species distribution, noting where each one is found across the habitat
• Link what is found to the conditions, explaining adaptation to those conditions

A habitat study, worked

Here is the shape of a habitat study, with invented numbers used purely to show the reasoning. They are an illustration and not a survey of anywhere. A student samples the same grassland at two points, one at the field edge beside a hedge and one in the middle. At the edge they record a soil pH of six point two, partial shade for part of the day, and damper ground. In the middle they record the same pH, full sun and drier ground. Sampling the same area at each point, they find nine plant species at the edge and four in the middle. What can be said, and what cannot. It can be said that biodiversity was higher at the edge in this sample, and that two abiotic factors differed, shade and moisture. It can be suggested that species needing shelter or damper ground are found where those conditions exist, which is what adaptation means here. It cannot be said that the hedge caused the difference, because only two points were sampled and other factors were not measured. Notice that the useful sentence names the factor, states what was found, and stops before claiming more than two samples can carry.

The claim that goes too far

Four statements about the study you have just read. Select the ONE that claims more than the evidence supports.

• Biodiversity was higher at the field edge than in the middle in this sample.
• The two sampling points differed in shade and in how damp the ground was.
• This proves that planting hedges always increases the number of plant species in a field.
• Species found only at the edge may be adapted to shelter or to damper ground.

Say what the management does

Assemble a sentence that explains rather than asserts.

Advising a farm

A farm wants to keep producing but also to support more wildlife. Take the decisions in order.

• The farm has one field of unimproved grassland that yields poorly. What should you say about it?
• Several hedges were removed years ago to enlarge fields. What is the case for restoring them?
• Part of the farm lies within a designated area. What does that mean in practice?
• The farmer asks whether any of this pays. What is the honest answer?

Write the management case

A farm is deciding how to manage its land for the next five years. Write the case for managing it in a way that supports biodiversity, using the correct terms.

• Define habitat and biodiversity, and explain the difference between abiotic and biotic factors
• Explain what improved and unimproved grassland mean, and which supports more species
• Name three measures the farmer could take, and explain what each one does
• Name two hedging species and two priority species from the specification list
• Explain what an Area of Special Scientific Interest protects, and how that differs from an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty
• Give one reason beyond goodwill that a farmer might manage land this way
• Finish with a judgement that acknowledges the trade between yield and diversity rather than pretending there is none