Ladybirds spotted on Springwatch Unsprung

Two of our CEH colleagues were live on the Red Button and web this week, appearing with Nick Baker on the Unsprung element of the popular BBC Springwatch series. On Wednesday, Dr Steve Thackeray spoke about nature's calendar and climate change, which he investigates as part of the shifting seasons phenology project he leads. Earlier in the week, Dr Helen Roy chatted about biological recording, citizen science and, of course, ladybirds! Read more about Helen's day on the Springwatch set in her blog post below.

BBC Springwatch provided an exquisite insight into the life history of the 2-spot ladybird, Adalia bipunctata, on Monday night (25 May). The short film was inspiringly beautiful. The detailed perspectives on the secret lives of these familiar beetles were accurately and quite brilliantly portrayed.

The life history of the 2-spot ladybird featured on Springwatch 2014.
Photo: Richard Comont

I had the privilege of providing some information on the ecology of ladybirds to the BBC Springwatch production team during the making of this film. The excitement and enthusiasm expressed by Vicky Webb (Producer) and Rob Morgan (Researcher) throughout the filming was fantastic. I remember Vicky calling after the hatching eggs had been filmed. She conveyed such delight at what is undoubtedly one of the (many) most aesthetic moments of the ladybird life cycle. Rob had spotted some exciting signs of parasitism and we enjoyed discussing the likely parasitic suspects. I was extremely excited just anticipating the broadcast of this film, which I knew would be in the first episode of Springwatch 2014. So imagine my excitement when I was invited to contribute to Springwatch Unsprung - and it was an amazing experience!

The buzz about the Springwatch Production “Village” of portacabins, trucks and marquees is incredible. The passion for natural history and science communication is so apparent. All day people are running around with cameras and sound equipment to convey the brilliance and diversity of all aspects of wildlife from the RSPB Minsmere Reserve. Conversations on booming bitterns, the delightful miniature suffocated clover, stalking stoats, glimpses of hawkmoths and, of course, the magical ladybirds provide an inspiring atmosphere.

The bittern hide - looking for some of the stars of Springwatch 2014 at RSPB Minsmere

During the day I was invited to contribute to Springwatch Extra with Euan McIlwraith and we enjoyed a magical afternoon talking about ladybirds, their predators and the ways in which ladybirds interact with many other species. The Minsmere woodland provided the perfect stage. I joined Brett Westwood for a short walk in which he revealed the delights of some tiny and obscure (and, in some cases, rare) plants exploiting the sandy soils on the reserve. It was great to find an 11-spot ladybird, Coccinella undecimpunctata, in amongst these hidden treasures (I have to confess it was Marcus Brent-Smith of webcam fame who actually, and quite literally, unearthed the ladybird).

In the evening I joined the Springwatch Unsprung team. Springwatch Unsprung gives the BBC audience an opportunity to contribute questions and comments on wildlife. It is broadcast immediately after Springwatch and is a fantastically lively show. For me Springwatch Unsprung provided the perfect opportunity to celebrate the legacy of ladybird recording in Britain in conversation with Nick Baker. The quiz, a regular feature on Springwatch Unsprung, was on ladybirds for the night and enabled some hints on identification to be conveyed. It was fantastic to be a small part of Springwatch and I am looking forward to another contribution from the Centre for Ecology & Hydrology when Stephen Thackeray is released on Unsprung on Wednesday night.

I would like to thank Sheryl Bawden, Vicky Webb, Rob Morgan, Brett Westwood, Euan McIlwraith, Marcus Brent-Smith, Anna Place, Nick Baker, Anne Gallagher and many others (catering, security, make-up, film crew...) for such a fantastic opportunity and for ensuring I was so welcome.

Helen Roy

The Springwatch Unsprung episodes are available to view on iPlayer for 3 weeks:

Ladybirds (episode 1)

Phenology (episode 3)

Related links

Details of how to download the iRecord Ladybirds app for Android and iOS

UK Ladybird Survey

iRecord

When and how to use citizen science for environmental projects

Helen's staff page at CEH

Steve Thackeray's staff page at CEH

Shifting seasons and ecosystem consequences project

BBC Springwatch

The citizen science toolbox – a practical guide how and when to use citizen science

In this guest blog CEH’s Dr Michael Pocock explains why he has helped develop a new guide to Choosing and Using Citizen Science.

Citizen science is accelerating in its popularity as an approach to undertake scientific research and monitoring and for people to engage with science. This popularity can mean that some people see citizen science as the answer to any and every question or goal. However, citizen science is not a single approach – it is a diversity of approaches. To put it another way, citizen science is not a multitool – it is a whole tool box of individual techniques and approaches.

The new guide to choosing and using citizen science

Citizen science is a tool box of approaches, and it is important for people to explore the range of approaches, in other words to work out which citizen science ‘tool’ they could use for the task in hand – or indeed whether citizen science is unsuitable. But how do people work through the maze of all the possible approaches, from long-term to short-term projects, working with schools, the media, naturalists or local communities, using smartphone apps or forms sent by post? Hopefully our Guide, published today, will help.

It was not only us who realised that there was this need to help people explore the utility of citizen science. There has been huge enthusiasm in the Scottish Environment Protection Agency (SEPA) about citizen science and so they commissioned us at CEH to produce a Guide to 'Choosing and Using Citizen Science', which is published today. Initially this was going to be a report for their own staff, but in talking to people about the project, we all quickly realised that many people outside of SEPA and CEH would really appreciate a user-friendly guide to the subject following from the enthusiasm for our Guide to Citizen Science  which presented best practice to running citizen science projects.

The central part of the guide is a handy flowchart helping people to explore citizen science options. This is backed up by thoughts on what needs to be considered before beginning a citizen science project. However, I think that the process of thinking carefully is far more important than the final answer from the flowchart – and I hope that those who use the guide will develop better thought-out citizen science projects. These will undoubtedly be more successful projects.

The guide to Choosing and Using Citizen Science is backed up by a comprehensive report. Within the report we also produced some case studies for SEPA as to how citizen science could be applied to address the problem of locating river barriers (old weirs, and so on, which restrict the migration of salmon) and monitoring water quality at a local site (The Seven Lochs Wetland Park in Glasgow). It was challenging to consider the different citizen science approaches that could be used to address these questions – and the final decision as to whether and how to use citizen science will come down to people actually developing these projects!

Citizen science in action during a wildlife survey

So, if you are wondering if citizen science is for you, then we hope that this guide will help. But, if you have decided to start a citizen science project, what then? I’d recommend referring to our best practice Guide to Citizen Science which we published in 2012 and has received a superb response from people across the world. Volunteer involvement in science has been going on for such a long time (the Biological Records Centre celebrates its 50th anniversary this year!), so citizen science has a long, successful history and surely will have an even richer, more diverse future.

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Dr Michael Pocock is an ecologist based in the Biological Records Centre at the Centre for Ecology & Hydrology. He leads several citizen science projects with the aim of collectively undertaking hypothesis-led research and is the co-leader of the long running Conker Tree Science project in which people are invited to help discover more about an invasive insect that is damaging horse-chestnut trees.

Michael is currently working on the Big Bumblebee Discovery, the first project in an exciting new programme, the Great EDF Energy experiment, a collaboration between the British Science Association and EDF Energy.

Additional information

CEH news story about the new guide and background research

Download the new guide

The Biological Records Centre - 50 years old in 2014

Assessing and managing the risks of climate change

The latest report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), published this week, says that the effects of climate change are already occurring on all continents and across the oceans. In many cases, it warns, the world is ill-prepared for risks from a changing climate. There are opportunities to respond to such risks, it says, though they will be difficult to manage with high levels of warming.

The report, titled Climate Change 2014: Impacts, Adaptation, and Vulnerability, from Working Group II of the IPCC, details the impacts of climate change to date, the future risks from a changing climate, and the opportunities for effective action to reduce risks.

Responding to its publication, scientists from the Centre for Ecology & Hydrology (CEH) made the following comments:

Dr Richard Harding, Senior Hydrologist

“The first report of the IPCC fifth assessment concluded that human activities were already having an impact on our climate. This second report assesses the considerable number of studies investigating the current and future impacts of these climate changes and possible adaption strategies. The report concludes that warming increases the likelihood of severe, pervasive and irreversible impacts. Some ecosystems and cultures are already at risk from climate change and there is a warning of irreversible changes. In the future we will see increasing water scarcity and negative impacts on food production. Climate change is increasing the risks of extreme events (flooding, high temperatures etc) and the impacts are greatest for the most disadvantaged communities.

These impacts can be moderated by reducing their rate of change by mitigation, i.e. reducing our greenhouse gas emissions, and planning. The impacts from recent climate extremes show a considerable vulnerability and exposure to present day variability. This vulnerability will increase as the climate changes. The impacts, however, can be moderated by adaptive planning, by all sections of society. A first step towards this adaption is reducing our exposure to current extremes - this is a double win, giving protection now and increased resilience in the future.

This report is yet another wake-up call to take action on climate change. It illustrates that it is not too late to take action but the consequences of inaction will be wide-ranging and serious.”

Dr Stephen Thackeray, Lake ecologist and project lead of Shifting seasons, climate change & ecosystems consequences:

“The second report of the IPCC fifth assessment capitalises upon the increasing body of evidence that climate change has already had an effect upon wild plants and animals, and the wider ecosystems within which they interact. The report makes it clear that these effects may be complex because ecosystems respond to the interactive effects of a changing climate and many other stressors, such as habitat modification and pollution. It is clear that we need to understand, and plan for, these interactive effects if we are to successfully manage the natural world under ongoing climate change.”

Additional information

CEH scientists take part in research looking at the impacts of climate change on species and the environment and have an extensive network of long-term monitoring and experimental field sites. Analysis and modelling of these data provide early warning of change and are helping to deliver management solutions for land and freshwaters across the UK and globally.

Climate change is increasing the risk of extreme events.

Research involving CEH showed that the
Comma butterfly has expanded its UK range
northwards rapidly. Photo: Shutterstock

Examples of CEH climate change research

Future Flows and Groundwater Levels project details and datasets

Shifting seasons, climate change and ecosystem consequences project details

Ecological Processes & Resilience science area 

Meeting the Challenges of Environmental Change - CEH's Science Strategy 2014-2019

Related CEH news on climate change research

Drought and climate change - an uncertain future?

Water and climate change in the UK - assessing the evidence

Climate impacts evidence for biodiversity changes in the UK's countryside

Butterfly expanding northwards with warming temperatures and changed diet

Accelerating climate change exerts strong pressure on Europe's mountain flora

Wildlife responds increasingly rapidly to climate change

Posted by Paulette Burns

Understanding Biosphere - Atmosphere Interactions and feedbacks

CEH's new Science Strategy, which was published in January 2014, identifies three interdependent, major societal and environmental challenges: Securing the Value of Nature, Building Resilience to Environmental Hazards, and Managing Environmental Change. We're delivering the strategy through a number of Science Areas and underpinning activities.

Over the next few weeks you can find out more about each Science Area as we profile them in a series of blog posts.

“@NERCscience: NERC's Centre for Ecology & Hydrology (@CEHScienceNews) new Science Strategy http://t.co/uM3MQc5OXL” securing value of nature
— Oxfordshire Nature (@ONCForg) January 31, 2014

The first Science Area to focus on is Biosphere-Atmosphere Interactions. There are crucial societal and environmental issues relating to air pollutants, greenhouse gases, and global carbon and nitrogen cycles. CEH research aims to understand and quantify interactions between the biosphere and atmosphere based on measurements, experiments and modelling of greenhouse gases, reactive air pollutants, water and energy.

Surface-atmosphere exchanges of gases & aerosols play fundamental role in determining air quality & are an important driver of climate
— CEH Science News (@CEHScienceNews) February 5, 2014

In turn, biological communities & the physical environment change in response to changes in climate & atmospheric pollution
— CEH Science News (@CEHScienceNews) February 5, 2014

CEH's long-term investigations at Auchencorth Moss, an ombrotrophic peat bog
in Midlothian, demonstrate that these areas remove significant amounts of carbon
from the atmosphere. Photo: Barnaby Smith/CEH.

See more photos of Auchencorth Moss field site on Flickr.

Developing the policy basis for addressing these issues demands the combination of monitoring and modelling of the exchange of gases, aerosols, particulate material, energy and water at land and water surfaces, and effects on local, regional and global climate.

Our BAI Science Area quantifies surface-atmosphere exchanges & interactions using measurements, experiments & modelling
— CEH Science News (@CEHScienceNews) February 5, 2014

We study a wide range of habitats, incl forest, grassland, wetlands, urban areas and cropland, including bioenergy crops
— CEH Science News (@CEHScienceNews) February 5, 2014

Read more about our Bioenergy crops research in our Energy and the Environment portal.

CEH has studied the impact of bioenergy crop land-use changes
on soil carbon stocks and greenhouse gas emissions.

Our BAI research supports UK, Euro & global policies to mitigate environmental & health impacts of pollution, land use & climate change
— CEH Science News (@CEHScienceNews) February 5, 2014

CEH science quantifies environmental impacts and provides evidence
for policy-makers.

Our Nutrient World, published in February 2013, highlighted how humans have massively altered the natural flows of nitrogen, phosphorus and other nutrients. While this has had huge benefits for world food and energy production, it has caused a web of water and air pollution.

The Review of Transboundary Air Pollution, published in June 2012, found that the chemical climate of the UK has changed dramatically over the last 30 years and continues to change as a consequence of UK and European policies to solve air pollution problems.

Recently published research and commentaries highlight some of our work in Biosphere - Atmosphere Interactions.

The value of acknowledging societal costs of N2O emissions - CEH-led study featured by @SfEP http://t.co/wT2z8Ffera #greeneconomy
— CEH Science News (@CEHScienceNews) January 29, 2014

Author Dr Chris Huntingford comments on new short lived climate pollutants paper in @NatureClimate http://t.co/PdYTBG9p2z #climate #science
— CEH Science News (@CEHScienceNews) November 21, 2013

Evaluating performance of commonly used gas analysers for methane eddy covariance flux measurements http://t.co/relgjMiQhF #oa discussion
— CEH Paper Alerts (@CEHPaperAlerts) February 10, 2014

@CEHScienceNews Chris Malley et al: ozone variation UK #EMEP supersites in Eurocontext: spot them in their clusters! http://t.co/IPVR7cqPw1
— Christine Braban (@ChrisBraban) November 17, 2013

New paper: Remote sensing of leaf nitrogen pools in crops & grasslands in Europe http://t.co/kkNngEDuoo -#openaccess study in Biogeosciences
— EGU (@EuroGeosciences) October 7, 2013

Read more about Biosphere-Atmosphere Interactions on the CEH website, including a Science Area Summary [PDF].

How exposed are the world’s rivers to pollutant chemicals discharged from domestic sources?

CEH scientists Andrew Johnson, Virginie Keller and Richard Williams blog about their new paper examining pollution in the world’s rivers.

All around the world we use more and more chemicals in toothpaste, drugs, shampoo, hormones for cancer treatment and as a means of contraception. All these chemicals go "down-the-drain" and a proportion escape from sewage treatment plants before entering rivers and potentially affecting wildlife. A good example is the issue of sex hormones discharged by the human population resulting in male fish displaying female characteristics (e.g. egg proteins in their blood, egg sites in their testes), which caused alarm around the world.

One way of finding out the scale of national exposure to such chemicals is to get chemists to test for every chemical in every river in their country. Such monitoring campaigns are extremely challenging and very costly to carry out. Even in countries such as the UK, which has a small geographical area and leads the world in environmental monitoring, the level of effort required is difficult to sustain. For developing nations the expense of such monitoring campaigns means such information and knowledge is beyond reach.

Our new study, recently published as an open access paper in the journal Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry, used a geographic-based model which compares population with river flow to assess the available natural dilution for the human wastes that contain chemicals. The less dilution available within a nation, the higher the exposure levels to these chemicals will be.

As we all know rainfall patterns can vary dramatically throughout the year, and from year to year. The model used long-term annual and monthly averages of river flow (based on up to 60 years of measured rainfall) to generate a range of dilution factors.

Many nations have poorly populated and densely populated regions. Thus, for each nation, a variety of dilution factors were examined (expressed as a range of percentiles). The spatial variability of the dilution factors can vary considerably depending on the percentiles – defining low to high flows – and types of flow considered (annual or monthly).

Predicted values of national annual median (50%ile) dilution factor

The results are interesting. In Europe, the UK median dilution factor of 37 puts it in the upper third of nations exposed to domestic chemicals. However, the 25%ile results – a measure of low flow dilution – give the UK a dilution factor of only 6, making it the most exposed country. This is a consequence of our relatively dry summers and high population densities in the South and Midlands. By way of contrast the French median dilution factor is 76 and 25%ile dilution factor is 47. This tells us that French fish have a lot less to worry about than British fish!

The paper is open access so readers can look up their exposure to chemicals by examining the tables we’ve created. We hope that environmentalists and regulators from countries across the world, as well as the general public, are able to use the results, to better address this important issue.

Andrew Johnson, Virginie Keller and Richard Williams

Additional information

The full paper reference is:

Keller V.D.J., Williams, R.J., Lofthouse, C., Johnson, A.C. (2014). Worldwide estimation of river concentrations of any chemical originating from sewage-treatment plants using dilution factors.
Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry, 33, 447-452. doi: 10.1002/etc.2441

Staff page of Professor Andrew Johnson

Staff page of Richard Williams