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á Natural Environment Research Council Institute of Terrestrial Ecology Annual Report 1979 NERC Copyright 1980 First published 1980 Printed in Great Britain by The Cambrian News, Aberystwyth. ISBN 0 904282 43 0 Institute of Terrestrial Ecology 68 Hills Road Cambridge CB2 1LA 0223 (Cambridge) 69745 ACKNOWLEDGEMENT The Institute wishes to thank Mr. Bob Medler for drawing the figures in this report. The work was carried out as part of his year's sandwich course at our Monks Wood Experimental Station, COVER PH OTOG RAP H S Huntingdon. Mr. Medler is a cartography student at the Luton College of Higher Education. A tagged rabbit free-living at Monks Wood Experimental Station. Photograph : D T Davies Sporocarp (toadstool) of fly agaric. Photograph : J Pelham Populus trichocarpa growing at a range of spacings (0 .3-1 .0m) in fertile agricultural soil at Bush. near Edinburgh. Photographed 5 years after planting cuttings. Photograph : M G R Cannel! Concrete mixer modified by ITE engineers for the bulk mixing and sieving of soils. Photograph : S E Allen Male cuckoo—head and throat in moult. Photograph : I Wyllie Toad. Photograph by the late J E Lousley from his collection presented to ITE by Mrs J E Lousley. Ramalina siliquosa lichen. The Institute of Terrestrial Ecology (ITE) was established in 1973, Photograph : R 0 Millar from the former Nature Conservancy's research stations and staff, joined later by the Institute of Tree Biology and the Culture Gentiana pneumonanthe L. in flower. Centre of Algae and Protozoa. ITE contributes to and draws upon Photograph : S B Chapman the collective knowledge of the fourteen sister institutes which make up the Natural Environment Research Council, spanning all Male wood white butterfly. the environmental sciences. Photograph : M S Warren The Institute studies the factors determining the structure, composition and processes of land and freshwater systems, and of individual plant and animal species. It is developing a sounder scientific basis for predicting and modelling environmental trends arising from natural or man-made change. The results of this research are available to thoe responsible for the protection, management and wise use of our natural resources. Nearly half of ITE's work is research commissioned by customers, such as the Nature Conservancy Council. who require information for wildlife conservation, the Department of Energy and the Department of the Environment. The remainder is fundamental research supported by NERC. ITE's expertise is widely used by international organisations in overseas projects and programmes of research. 1 Contents Section I 5 RESEARCH ON TERRESTRIAL ECOLOGY: SUMMARY REPORT Section II 7 LONGER RESEARCH REPORTS 7 Estimating and comparing population densities of red deer Cervus elaphus L. in concealing habitats 13 Rabbit enclosures : a viable scientific approach? 19 The extinction of the large blue and the conservation of the black hairstreak (a contrast of failure and success) 23 A conceptual approach to plants as a renewable source of energy, with particular reference to Great Britain 34 Methods for classifying map data, with particular reference to indicator species analysis and K-means clustering 42 Analysis of multivariate vegetation data 46 Some aspects of the nutrient status of native British plants Section III 49 RESEARCH OF THE INSTITUTE IN 1979 INVERTEBRATE ECOLOGY 49 The insect fauna of Helianthemum chamaecistus in the Stamford area 50 The ecology of the wood white butterfly 50 The butterfly monitoring scheme 51 The comparative morphology of Myrmica 54 The distribution of beetles in some upland habitat types 55 Dorset heathland survey 61 Pasture woodlands VERTEBRATE ECOLOGY 61 Shearwaters in Victoria. Australia 63 Winter moult in cuckoos 64 Fluoride in predatory mammals and their prey 64 Relationships between the feeding ecology and social organisation or cats 65 Grey squirrel foraging 65 The status of deer in England and Wales 66 The dispersion of red deer within a mixed-aged Sitka spruce plantation and the incidence of browsing and bark-stripping ANIMAL FUNCTION 67 Ecological effects of aquatic herbicides on freshwater ecosystems 67 Activity and feeding rhythms in the starling Sturnus vulgaris 70 Breeding in relation to age in sparrowhawks 72 Toxic metals in puffins Fratercula arctica from the Isle of May and St. Kilda 72 Pollutants in gannet eggs 77 Possible effects of weather and organochlorine residues on the behaviour of the grey heron Ardea cinerea 78 The effect of Eulan WA New on frog tadpoles 79 Growth and development of tadpoles of the common toad Bufo bufo L. PLANT BIOLOGY 80 Taxonomy of sub-antarctic mosses : Grimmia and Schistidium 81 Accumulation and effects of airborne fluoride on the saxicolous lichen Ramalina siliquosa 2 85 The breeding system in Agrostis setacea 86 Ecology of the marsh gentian 86 The establishment of seedlings on lowland heaths 89 Standing crop and organic matter accumulation on British heathlands 90 Dynamics of heather stripes 91 Growth response of Scots pine to site factors over Great Britain 92 The initial establishment and early survival of Scots pine Pinus silvestris 93 An automatic system for measuring shoot length in Sitka spruce 94 Trees for planting on coal waste 95 Appraisal of mini-rotation forestry 96 Apical dominance in tropical trees PLANT COMMUNITY ECOLOGY 97 Ecology of railway land 98 Bracken and scrub control on lowland heaths 99 Effects of simulated 'acid rain' on foliar leaching 99 Gaseous pollutants and acid rain : progress towards understanding effects on forest trees 103 Scottish deciduous woodlands 103 Regeneration of native pinewoods 106 National woodland classification 107 Effects of different tree species on soil at Gisburn SOIL SCIENCE 108 Soil and marginal upland in Cumbria 111 Microbial characteristics of soils 111 Mineralogical indicators to determine homogeneity of soil.parent material 113 Cellulose decomposition : some technical aspects of the cotton strip method 114 Factors influencing the production of sporocarps (toadstools) of the fly agaric, a mycorrhizal associate of many trees 114 Selection pressures in earthworm evolution DATA AND INFORMATION 118 Services Computing Biometrics 119 Biological Records Centre 120 Terrestrial Environment Information System Publications Education 121 Library 121 Research Island biogeography CHEMISTRY AND INSTRUMENTATION 121 Services Chemistry at Merlewood and Monks Wood 123 Radiochemistry Engineering Plant culture 124 Photography 124 Research and development On-line data processing Long-term nutrient status of soils 125 The application of isoelectric focusing to isoenzyme separation Radionuclides in terrestrial ecosystems 127 Engineering developments 3 128 CULTURE CENTRE OF ALGAE AND PROTOZOA General review Lipids, membranes and freezing 128 Diatoms of inland saline habitats 130 Section IV PROJECTS 136 Section V STAFF LIST 140 Section VI PUBLICATIONS 145 Section VII CONTRACT REPORTS 152 Section VIII COMMISSIONED RESEARCH CONTRACTS 153 Section IX PUBLICATIONS FOR SALE á Section I 5 Research on Terrestrial Ecology : Summary Report During the last 3 years, in particular, the research 3. Effects of sulphur, fluorine and other airborne programme of the Institute of Terrestrial Ecology has pollutants. Again, sufficient progress has been been gradually modified. ITE's research strategy was made with research in this field to indicate the presented in detail in last year's Annual Report, and, in need for a better evaluation of the interactirfg the pursuit of that strategy, some important changes effects of various airborne pollutants. In the past, have been introduced, with the approval of the Natural monitoring of such pollutants has largely been Environment Research Council, to meet and to anti- concentrated in urban areas, and the effects on cipate the requirements of existing and potential crop and semi-natural ecosystems require clarifi- customers for commissioned research, while maintain- cation. ing a healthy balance of fundamental ecological research. The effects of these changes may be 4. Toxicology of organic pollutants and heavy summarised as follows metals in terrestrial and freshwater systems. Although much work has already been done on 1. There has been an increased concentration of these pollutants, monitoring of the effects of research on the ecological consequences of existing and new pollutants remains an essential changes, actual or proposed, in land use. task. More exact understanding of the effects of pollutants also needs to be related to dynamic 2. There has been a reduced emphasis on research changes in the physiology of organisms. concerned with species and habitats of purely conservation interest, except where conservation 5. Synoptic limnology—freshwater ecosystems. agencies like the Nature Conservancy Council Water is an essential resource for man, but it is also have been willing to commission the research. one of the controlling influences of terrestrial Because the Nature Conservancy Council's sup- ecology. As yet, we have insufficient knowledge port for commissioned research in ITE has de- of the ecology of Britain's extensive freshwater clined sharply, the reduction in research on wildlife systems, .and ITE has chosen to work on the conservation has also been marked. synoptic aspects of these systems in collaboration with the Freshwater Biological Association and 3. Many overseas countries are showing considerable the Institute of Hydrology. interest in ecological research, and ITE has there- fore given increased emphasis