Water Channels - The traditional irrigation culture using water channels as model for sustainable water management: Effects on local biodiversity (NFP 61)

Bruno Baur , Ramona Melliger, Eliane Riedener, Hans-Peter Rusterholz, Raimund Rodewald (Stiftung Landschaftsschutz Schweiz), Peter Knoepfel (ETH Lausanne), Andreas Rigling (WSL Birmensdorf), Simon Birrer (Vogelwarte Sempach)


Open water channels have been used for centuries in the arid mountain regions of the world for the transportation and distribution of scarce water for use as drinking water and, in particular, process water in agriculture (irrigation water). In the past decades, however, this traditional irrigation culture has been replaced by modern sprinkler irrigation systems, which may affect the local biodiversity. In the framework of NFP 61 (Sustainable water use) we compare the biodiversity of traditionally irrigated and sprinkler irrigated hay meadows in the canton Valais. As biodiversity indictors we consider the diversity of vascular plants and terrestrial gastropods.

Keywords: biodiversity - land use - irrigation - grassland


Publications

Riedener E, Melliger RL, Rusterholz H-P & Baur B (2015) — Changes in landscape composition of differently irrigated hay meadows in an arid mountain region — Applied Vegetation Science 18: 242–251

Riedener E, Rusterholz H-P & Baur B (2014) — Land-use abandonment owing to irrigation cessation affects the biodiversity of hay meadows in an arid mountain region — Agriculture, Ecosystems & Environment 185: 144–152

Melliger RL, Riedener E, Rusterholz H-P & Baur B (2014) — Do different irrigation techniques affect the small-scale patterns of plant diversity and soil characteristics in mountain hay meadows? — Plant Ecology 215: 1037–1046

Riedener E, Rusterholz H-P & Baur B (2013) — Effects of different irrigation systems on the biodiversity of species-rich hay meadows — Agriculture, Ecosystems & Environment 164: 62–69

 

Poster

 

 

Traditional water channel

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