ECOLOGICAL REPORT - LIFELINES DRY STONE WALL SURVEY MENDIP HILLS AONB FOR MENDIP HILLS AONB SERVICE NB. Information on legally protected, rare or vulnerable species may appear in ecological reports. In such cases it is recommended that appropriate caution be used when circulating copies. March 2008 CB5607/1583 Betts Ecology Bank House, Martley, Worcester WR6 6PB United Kingdom T +44 (0)1886 888445 F +44 (0)1886 888782 E [email protected] www.bettsecology.com ©Betts Ecology/Mendip Hills AONB Service Ecological Report - Lifelines Dry Stone Wall Survey Ecological Report - Lifelines Dry Stone Wall Survey CONTROL SHEET General Report Information Client Mendip Hills Area of Outstanding Beauty Service Report title Ecological Report - Lifelines Dry Stone Wall Survey Location Mendip Hills Area of Outstanding Beauty Date of site risk 18 June 2007 assessment Lead ecologist signature Dr. Ann Hill - Principal Ecologist Date report issued 17 March 2008 Report approved by Dr. Christopher Betts – Director of Science Report Version Control Version Date Author Description 0.1 26/11/07 Dr Ann Hill Document created 0.1 19/12/07 Dr Ann Hill Draft document issued 0.2 19/02/08 Dr Ann Hill Draft 2 issued 1.0 10/03/08 Dr Ann Hill Final document issued Whilst all due and reasonable care is taken in the preparation of reports, Christopher Betts Environmental Biology accept no responsibility whatsoever for any consequences of the release of this report to third parties. 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Ecological Report - Lifelines Dry Stone Wall Survey i Ecological Report - Lifelines Dry Stone Wall Survey CONTENTS RESULTS SUMMARY AND RECOMMENDATIONS ................................................................... 1 Summary .......................................................................................................... 1 Recommendations ............................................................................................... 3 SURVEY RESULTS .................................................................................................... 5 Site ................................................................................................................. 5 Mendip Hills AONB Dry Stone Walls ........................................................................... 5 Aspect .......................................................................................................... 7 Altitude ........................................................................................................ 8 Height and width ............................................................................................. 8 Plant species observations ................................................................................ 10 Wall flora .................................................................................................... 13 Plant Communities of the Mendip Hills AONB Dry Stone Walls ......................................... 15 Group 1....................................................................................................... 18 Group 2....................................................................................................... 20 Group 3....................................................................................................... 21 Group 4....................................................................................................... 23 Group 5....................................................................................................... 24 Species diversity of the Mendip Hills AONB Dry Stone Walls ............................................ 27 Species diversity and individual samples ............................................................... 27 Species diversity and plant communities ............................................................... 28 Fauna of the Mendip Hills AONB Dry Stone Walls ......................................................... 32 Literature Review and Third Party Data Search .......................................................... 36 Appraisal of the Ecological Interest of the Mendip Hills AONB Dry Stone Walls ..................... 40 SUPPORTING INFORMATION...................................................................................... 45 Scope and Objectives ......................................................................................... 45 Limitations ...................................................................................................... 45 General Site Description and Methods...................................................................... 46 Site description ............................................................................................. 46 Method ....................................................................................................... 47 APPENDICES ........................................................................................................ 51 Appendix I: The full list of 149 plant species, with the individual species' frequency and abundance values, recorded on dry stone walls within the Mendip Hills Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. ................................................................................................ 53 Appendix II: The full list of plant species for each individual community group, with the individual species' frequency and abundance values..................................................... 57 Appendix III: Fact sheets for the five saxicolous plant community groups ........................ 65 Group 1 .......................................................................................................... 67 Group 2 .......................................................................................................... 68 ii Ecological Report - Lifelines Dry Stone Wall Survey Group 3 .......................................................................................................... 69 Group 4 .......................................................................................................... 70 Group 5 .......................................................................................................... 71 Appendix IV: The full list of plant species recorded within 1 m of dry stone walls of the Mendip Hills Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. ................................................................. 73 Appendix V: MATCH output ............................................................................... 77 Appendix VI: Two dimensional ordination plot............................................................ 93 Appendix VII: Fauna recorded within or adjacent to the dry stone wall habitat of the Mendip Hills Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. ....................................................................... 95 Appendix VIII: References and Bibliography ............................................................... 99 Appendix IX: Third party data search................................................................... 103 Bristol Regional Environmental Records Centre ...................................................... 103 Somerset Environmental Records Centre .............................................................. 121 Figure 1: Map of the Mendip Hills Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty showing the location of the randomly selected survey sites. The shaded boxes represent the 74 randomly selected dry stone walls visited and surveyed. The crosses represent the approximate location of 11 randomly selected sites visited but not surveyed. .................................................................................... 5 Figure 2: Circular plot of aspect of 74 dry stone walls surveyed in the Mendip Hills Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. The plot shows the distribution of aspect observations around the circle. The green smoothed line indicates the frequency of observations. ............................... 8 Figure 3: Histogram of the altitude of 74 dry stone walls within the Mendip Hills Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty....................................................................................................... 8 Figure 4: Histograms of the width and height of 74 dry stone walls within the Mendip Hills Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. ...................................................................................... 9 Figure 5: The relationship between wall height and width for 74 dry stone walls in the Mendip Hills Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. ............................................................................ 9 Figure 6: Map of Mendip Hills Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty showing the location, height and width of the 74 dry stone walls surveyed between June and August 2007. ............................. 10 Figure 7: Comparison of the number of plant species recorded on 74 dry stone walls in the Mendip Hills Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. The box plots show the median and interquartile range of individual variables. .............................................................................................. 11 Figure 8: The relationship between the height of 74 dry stone walls and the number of species observed on each wall. Observations were recorded over ten survey days between June and August in the Mendip Hills Area of Outstanding Natural