Impact of artificial light on flora and fauna in The Netherlands
Informations
- Funding country
Netherlands- Acronym
- -
- URL
- -
- Start date
- 10/15/2010
- End date
- 1/31/2016
- Budget
- 877,996 EUR
Fundings
| Name | Role | Start | End | Amount |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Open technologieprogramma Open Technologieprogramma 2010 STW | Grant | 10/15/2010 | 1/31/2016 | 877,996 EUR |
Abstract
Artificial lighting of both built-up and rural areas continues to increase, especially in the Western hemisphere. As a consequence more and more areas, including nature areas, are illuminated at night. This has not only consequences for social safety and energy demands, but may also have significant impacts on wildlife populations in addition to other environmental stress factors like climate change and eutrophication. Research on the impact of artificial lights at the level of plant and animal populations is needed to assess these impacts and to develop alternatives which lack negative consequences. Yet, research on population level effects of artificial light is extremely scarce. In this project the impact of artificial light will be assessed in a large-scale experiment focusing on populations of vascular plants, moths, amphibians, birds, bats and small mammals, representing different species groups of Dutch wildlife. Changes in phenology, abundance and species composition will be monitored over a 4 year period in 40 sites. These sites will be illuminated with common artificial lights (10), kept in the dark (10), or illuminated with one of two new types of habitat friendly lights (2x10 sites). In this large scale experiment populations of the different species groups will be monitored by not-for-profit species group specialist organizations with the aid of skilled volunteers; but coordinated by scientific staff. Our set-up enables us to make comparisons within site (changes over the 4 year period) as well as between sites (the different light treatments) for each species group as well as for species groups combined. The results will provide an answer to the question what impact artificial lights have on wildlife at the population level as well as an evaluation of the extent to which friendly lights help to diminish negative effects. In addition to the large-scale experiment, two PhD-projects will be set up to assess the mechanisms behind the impact of artificial lights on wildlife populations. One will focus on the impact of artificial light on night life ecology, with herbivory by moth caterpillars related to vegetation composition and quality as model study. The second PhD-project will focus on the impact of artificial lights on avian reproduction by assessing breeding performance and local survival, in combination with in-depth studies on foraging and breeding behaviour. The results obtained from these PhD-studies interact strongly with the large-scale monitoring experiment as the insights in the mechanisms are necessary to understand the impacts monitored, while the results of the monitoring experiment will yield new hypotheses for the PhD-projects. This project will be the first to test newly developed habitat friendly lights under large-scale field conditions. It will thus help industry to develop such lamps, and will aid government agencies and nature conservation organizations to make decisions about illumination, and the types of lamps to be used. The project will therefore be carried out in close collaboration between scientists, skilled volunteers, (nature) area managers and private companies. The information acquired is becoming absolutely essential in a world in which, in some parts, it is never dark.