The 31 of May, Peter will talk about multifunctionality of wetlands at ”Baltic Breakfast” (https://www.su.se/stockholms-universitets-ostersjocentrum/policyverksamhet/baltic-breakfast#kommandebalticbreakfastolikav%C3%A5tmarkerkr%C3%A4vsf%C3%B6rattn%C3%A5olikam%C3%A5l). It can also be viewed after the event at the link above.

The 25-26 of May John will present some results from our project at a water conference at the Bolmen Research station https://forskningsstationbolmen.se/valkommen-till-vattenkonferensen/

Our paper on Tradeoffs and synergies in wetland multifunctionality, recently published in Science of the Total Environment, was displayed at the Global water forum, with a new short summary written by Peter Hambäck. It can be found here: https://globalwaterforum.org/2023/02/23/tradeoffs-and-synergies-in-wetland-multifunctionality-a-scaling-issue/

Now our paper on Tradeoffs and synergies in wetland multifunctionality have been published in the journal Science of the total Environment. It is a joint effort by several researchers in different fields and was initiated at a conference and workshop in Stockholm in October 2021 (se post further down for more details on that). It can be found as full text pdf here.

We had a meeting in Stockholm the 23-25 November to discuss the hydrology and bathymetry data. The enormous amount of data generated from the water level meters and the bathymetry surveys needs to be processed in an efficient way to be able to evaluate. Now we have developed a strategy to incorporate the data into GIS for further handling and evaluation, and to produce bathymetry maps of all the wetlands.

The 26 of November, we arranged a combined Christmas dinner and workshop at Hushållningssällskapets workplace Lilla Böslid, Halland for all landowners in our projects, where we also presented results from our studies. Peter and David from Stockholm university gave talks about the invertebrate results and a citizen science project on mosquitoes that we are planning for next year. Ca 40 persons attended, and we got much positive feedback from the landowners.

The risk of getting back malaria in Sweden is sometimes suggested as a real concern in discussions regarding large state-funded efforts to re-create wetlands to mitigate climate change or reduce eutrophication and increase landscape biodiversity. The latest we have found regarding this is from a magazine published by Derome where a professor in history, Kalle Bäck, calls the risk of malaria a “terrible consequence that nature conservationists have missed”, see attached article (in Swedish). The problem is that he is completely wrong.

Anders Lindström at SVA, the National Veterinary Institute states:

“It is a strange statement about malaria that Kalle Bäck makes. Firstly, it can be stated that the malaria that existed in Sweden in the 18th and 19th centuries was caused by Plasmodium vivax. The parasite that Bäck refers to as causing the most deaths in the world is Plasmodium falciparum, that is, a completely different species. P. falciparum has never been found in northern Europe because it is too cold here for the parasite to develop in the mosquitoes. Plasmodium vivax can certainly also kill infected humans, but to a much lesser degree. During the period 1749 – 1820 an average of 1045 people died per year from malaria in Sweden. The disease was endemic and common along the coast from Blekinge up to Ångermanland and around Mälaren and Vänern. When there were epidemic outbreaks, it appeared all over southern Sweden.

The species of malaria mosquitoes responsible for the spread of malaria parasites overwinter as fully grown female mosquitoes. You can still visit almost any stable attic and find malaria mosquitoes. The dredging of wetlands certainly reduced the population of malaria mosquitoes, but as I said, the mosquitoes are still there and are not rare.

The fact that malaria disappeared in Sweden is considered mainly to be due to better housing standards. The mosquitoes thrive in dark and damp stables. When the housing standard was lower, there was no major difference between animal houses and residential houses. Often the animals were outdoors all year round. When the houses became warmer, brighter, cleaner and with lower humidity than before, the mosquitoes preferred to stay in the increasingly common animal stables. Since malaria mosquitoes almost always bite at night and there is food for them in the stables, fewer people were bitten and the transmission of malaria parasites decreased until it stopped.

The improved health care and the use of quinine also reduced malaria parasites. In order for us to bring back malaria in Sweden, it would be required that we get a significant part of the population infected by malaria parasites and at the same time bring back the 18th century housing standard and that the healthcare system fails to identify and treat malaria cases. “

Now we have done the bathymetry measurements for all the wetlands! Sam and Sofia did the last one yesterday (the 111th). Great work!

We had a 2-day project group meeting at Lilla Böslid, Halland where we discussed among other things; current available data, future sampling strategies and forthcoming papers from the projects.

The annual meeting for the Swedish Environmental Protection Agency´s research grants on Wetland ecosystem services was held att Hushållningssällskapet Halland/LIFE-Goodstream the 17-18 of March. It was a hybrid meeting with ca 25 persons on site and ca 45 joining digitally. It was a very nice meeting (despite the weather during the field day) and we visited Halmstad University´s experimental set-up aswell as some of our sites in the Buffer project. All the 8 projects presented their work and we got oppertunities to good discussions and networking during the meeting.

Today we submitted a short article to inspire the public to explore wetland shorelines in order to experience the high biodiversity of insects and spiders. It is based on the findings in our projects which also are explained in the article. Results on beetles, spiders, flies, dragonflies and pollinators are presented. It will be published in ”Hallands Natur” (in Swedish).

The whole Biowetland project group attended a conference at Stockholm University (Multi-functional wetlands) the 27 of October and thereafter a 2-day workshop with ca 20 researchers discussing a joint paper on Constructed wetlands and synergies and trade-offs of wetland functions. A very good and rewarding 3-day event at Stockholm University and Tovetorp research station. Below are some photos from the conference and the workshop.

Some time must be spent on mainenance on the 125 water level meters. Here Sam changes batteries in one of them