Resolving a heated debate: The utility of prescribed burning as a management tool for biodiversity on lowland heath

1. Lowland heath is a priority habitat for conservation, nowadays largely managed for biodiversity. Historically, prescribed burning has been the principal management tool, but there are increasing calls to substitute burning with cutting to improve biodiversity outcomes. However, poor understanding of potential impacts compromises decision making. 2. Our study was carried out in the New Forest National Park, the largest area of lowland heath in Europe. Using a multi-trophic approach, we compared the ecological impact of prescribed burning with two types of vegetation cutting (swiping and baling) as management tools for biodiversity outcomes for up to 20 years after

• Publication year

  2023

• Venue

  Journal of Applied Ecology

• Publication date

  2023-07-10

• Fields of study

  Not labeled

• Identifiers
  DOI 10.1111/1365-2664.14471
• External record

  Open on Semantic Scholar

• Source metadata

  Semantic Scholar

• No claims are published for this paper.

• No concepts are published for this paper.

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