A multi-scaled approach to vegetation and landscape assessment in the Barents region: Reindeer habitat in a climate of change ...

• Main Author: Danks, Fiona
• Format: Thesis
• Language: English
• Published: Apollo - University of Cambridge Repository 2006
• Subjects: Barents region; Reindeer habitat; barents region; Climate change; nenets; Nenets Autonomous Okrug; Rangifer tarandus
• Online Access: https://dx.doi.org/10.17863/cam.69619; https://www.repository.cam.ac.uk/handle/1810/322160

The circumpolar Arctic is predicted to be particularly affected by global change, including climate change. Likely ecological vulnerabilities include flora and dependent fauna. Reindeer (Rangifer tarandus), a keystone Arctic herbivore, are of particular importance, ecologically, as well as culturally and socio-economically. Many Arctic regions, particularly in Russia, lack critical data thereby limiting current understanding and the ability to assess consequences of change. This research develops new botanical and spatial vegetation data for a much understudied region, increases understanding of the landscape and its relationships to reindeer habitat and climate change through multi-scale assessments, and creates the potential for analysing consequences of change. Three primary scales of vegetation analysis and their limitations, uses and value are compared within the Barents region. More detailed examinations are undertaken within study regions in the Nenets Autonomous Okrug, Russia. Plant communities, ...