Long-term spatial changes of natural habitats in the rural landscape. Using old maps and archival sources for landscape assessment. Case study from Central Bohemia

Result code in IS VaVaI

<a href="https://www.isvavai.cz/riv?ss=detail&h=RIV%2F00027073%3A_____%2F16%3AN0000075" target="_blank" >RIV/00027073:_____/16:N0000075 - isvavai.cz</a>

Result on the web

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DOI - Digital Object Identifier

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Result language

angličtina

Original language name

Long-term spatial changes of natural habitats in the rural landscape. Using old maps and archival sources for landscape assessment. Case study from Central Bohemia

Original language description

It is impossible to understand several ecological phenomena without considering the processes that have occurred over the preceding decades, centuries, or longer periods. While maintaining natural habitats is central to reach ecological balance, the total area of these natural habitats has significantly decreased over the last two centuries, particularly during the second half of the 20th century. Significant losses of biodiversity and habitat degradation have occurred in Europe due to a heightened intensity of agricultural land management. In this case study of Central Bohemia, old maps and archival sources were used to illustrate the changes in the proportions of natural habitats over 250 years. Because maps alone cannot fully describe habitat conditions, a proposal for using archival information, and especially written materials, for natural habitat assessments is presented in the paper. Our results show that natural habitats began to decline at the end of 18th century within the intensively farmed region of Central Europe. Over 250 years, the areas that these habitats occupy have decreased by more than 80%. Particularly, wetlands and wet meadows declined during this period. Despite less precise identification of individual habitats in the past, old maps and written archival sources can serve as a useful source of good comparable data for estimating the spatial changes of natural habitats and landscape biodiversity.

Czech name

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Czech description

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Type

C - Chapter in a specialist book

CEP classification

AL - Art, architecture, cultural heritage

OECD FORD branch

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Project

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Continuities

I - Institucionalni podpora na dlouhodoby koncepcni rozvoj vyzkumne organizace

Publication year

2016

Confidentiality

S - Úplné a pravdivé údaje o projektu nepodléhají ochraně podle zvláštních právních předpisů

Book/collection name

Landscape in the Past & Forgotten Landscapes

ISBN

978-83-942469-5-2

Number of pages of the result

10

Pages from-to

343-352

Number of pages of the book

371

Publisher name

Institute of Archeology, Jagiellonian University in Kraków

Place of publication

Krakow

UT code for WoS chapter

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