The CROSSLINK Green-Blue Infrastructure values portfolio
CROSSLINK has quantified a core set of ecological values for stream-riparian green-blue infrastructure: The GBI values portfolio
- The CROSSLINK GBI Values portfolio comprises multiple habitat, biodiversity, ecosystem service and other ecosystem values, identified based on expert knowledge and stakeholder input, which are potentially affected by woody riparian buffers.
- Based on bespoke protocols, indicators for these assets were quantified across 127 stream reaches in the four CROSSLINK case study basins
- The values are divided into six broad groups:
- Habitat features comprise riparian vegetation properties (including riparian mapping at the catchment scale) and aspects such as dead wood (an important habitat for managers that supports several endangered species and, e.g., feeding and breeding of key fish species) and macrophyte cover (excessive macrophyte cover is regarded as problematical by landowners legally obliged to keep macrophyte growth minimal).
- Biodiversity indicators were identified for multiple key groups in linked stream-riparian food webs. These include microbial organisms at the base of soil and stream food webs that mediate many key ecosystem processes, diatoms and macroinvertebrates, representing key primary producers and consumers in freshwater food-webs, trees, and terrestrial invertebrate consumers (spiders, beetles). *Fish were sampled in the urban Oslo basin only.
- Supporting ecosystem services, as defined in the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment framework, quantify key ecosystem processes underpinning nutrient and carbon cycling (N and C isotopes, detritus decomposition, organic particle dynamics, primary production).
- Regulating ecosystem services comprise quantification of the degree of thermal buffering (identified as important for climate change mitigation) and sediment and nutrient reduction (addressing key land-use driven stressors) associated with riparian buffers.
- Resilience and ecological connectivity is quantified using biomarkers (polyunsaturated fatty acids), adult aquatic insect dispersal traits, and functional diversity/redundancy metrics.
- Water Framework Directive metrics, a key tool for helping managers evaluate if buffers help improve ecological status, are calculated for invertebrates and diatoms.