Cultural landscape aesthetics of beaver-modified landscapes, a cross cultural comparison

Urgent action is needed to reverse global biodiversity loss, as highlighted in the United Nations Biodiversity Conference (COP15) with their decision to adopt a Global Biodiversity Framework which stipulates restoring 30% of ecosystems by 2030. To address ecosystem restoration at landscape scale, beavers are considered ecosystem engineers as they modify their landscapes primarily via damming streams, creating a dynamic patchwork of unique habitats (Law et al., 2017).

Ecological and hydrological effects of beaver restoration are relatively well studied, however less is known on intangible cultural ecosystem services and disservices of beaver-modified landscapes (Ulicsni et al., 2020).

For example, how do changes associated with beaver modifications change landscape values such as aesthetics, sense of place, or place identity? Are beaver landscapes beautiful, or ugly? Do they disrupt or create new place identity values?

Through a variety of research methods, such as interviews & surveys, this project will assess cultural ecosystem services associated with beaver-modified landscapes across different cultural and ecological settings in the proposed study sites of Central Europe (e.g., Germany & Switzerland) and Scandinavia, compared with recent reintroductions in Britain.

Knowledge generated from this project will inform cultural ecosystem service assessment methods and understanding of such services in different cultural contexts, which is relevant for policy, as well as how to manage societal relations with respect to ecological management of reintroducing species in Great Britain and elsewhere.