title: Spatial patterns and environmental constraints on ecosystem services at a catchment scale.
abstract: Improved understanding and prediction of the fundamental environmental controls on ecosystem service supply across the landscape will help to inform decisions made by policy makers and land-water managers. To evaluate this issue for a local catchment case study, we explored metrics and spatial patterns of service supply for water quality regulation, agriculture production, carbon storage, and biodiversity for the Macronutrient Conwy catchment. Methods included using ecosystem models such as LUCI and JULES, integration of national scale field survey datasets, earth observation products and plant trait databases, to produce finely resolved maps of species richness and primary production. Analyses were done with both 1×1km gridded and subcatchment data. A common single gradient characterised catchment scale ecosystem services supply with agricultural production and carbon storage at opposing ends of the gradient as reported for a national-scale assessment. Species diversity was positively related to production due to the below national average productivity levels in the Conwy combined with the unimodal relationship between biodiversity and productivity at the national scale. In contrast to the national scale assessment, a strong reduction in water quality as production increased was observed in these low productive systems. Various soil variables were tested for their predictive power of ecosystem service supply. Soil carbon, nitrogen, their ratio and soil pH all had double the power of rainfall and altitude, each explaining around 45% of variation but soil pH is proposed as a potential metric for ecosystem service supply potential as it is a simple and practical metric which can be carried out in the field with crowd-sourcing technologies now available. The study emphasises the importance of considering multiple ecosystem services together due to the complexity of covariation at local and national scales, and the benefits of exploiting a wide range of metrics for each service to enhance data robustness.
authors.affiliation: Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, Environment Centre Wales, Deiniol Rd, Bangor LL57 2UW, UK. Electronic address: bae@ceh.ac.uk.
authors.forename: Bridget A
authors.initials: BA
authors.lastname: Emmett
authors.affiliation: Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, Environment Centre Wales, Deiniol Rd, Bangor LL57 2UW, UK.
authors.forename: David
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Cooper
authors.affiliation: Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, Lancaster Environment Centre, Lancaster, Bailrigg LA1 4AP, UK.
authors.forename: Simon
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Smart
authors.affiliation: School of Geography, Environment and Earth Sciences, Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand.
authors.forename: Bethanna
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Jackson
authors.affiliation: Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, Environment Centre Wales, Deiniol Rd, Bangor LL57 2UW, UK.
authors.forename: Amy
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Thomas
authors.affiliation: Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, Environment Centre Wales, Deiniol Rd, Bangor LL57 2UW, UK.
authors.forename: Bernard
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Cosby
authors.affiliation: Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, Environment Centre Wales, Deiniol Rd, Bangor LL57 2UW, UK.
authors.forename: Chris
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Evans
authors.affiliation: School of Biological Sciences, Bangor University, Bangor, Gwynedd LL57 2UW, UK.
authors.forename: Helen
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Glanville
authors.affiliation: School of Biological Sciences, Bangor University, Bangor, Gwynedd LL57 2UW, UK.
authors.forename: James E
authors.initials: JE
authors.lastname: McDonald
authors.affiliation: School of Ocean Sciences, Bangor University, Menai Bridge, Anglesey LL59 5AB, UK; Centre for Applied Marine Sciences, Bangor University, Menai Bridge, Anglesey LL59 5AB, UK.
authors.forename: Shelagh K
authors.initials: SK
authors.lastname: Malham
authors.affiliation: Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, Environment Centre Wales, Deiniol Rd, Bangor LL57 2UW, UK.
authors.forename: Miles
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Marshall
authors.affiliation: Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, Lancaster Environment Centre, Lancaster, Bailrigg LA1 4AP, UK.
authors.forename: Susan
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Jarvis
authors.affiliation: School of Ocean Sciences, Bangor University, Menai Bridge, Anglesey LL59 5AB, UK.
authors.forename: Paulina
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Rajko-Nenow
authors.affiliation: Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, MacLean Bldg, Benson Ln, Crowmarsh Gifford, Wallingford, Oxfordshire OX10 8BB, UK.
authors.forename: Gearoid P
authors.initials: GP
authors.lastname: Webb
authors.affiliation: Lancaster University, Lancaster Environment Centre, Lancaster, Bailrigg, LA1 4YQ, UK.
authors.forename: Sue
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Ward
authors.affiliation: Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, Environment Centre Wales, Deiniol Rd, Bangor LL57 2UW, UK.
authors.forename: Ed
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Rowe
authors.affiliation: Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, Environment Centre Wales, Deiniol Rd, Bangor LL57 2UW, UK.
authors.forename: Laurence
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Jones
authors.affiliation: Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, Bush Estate, Penicuik, Edinburgh EH26 0QB, UK.
authors.forename: Adam J
authors.initials: AJ
authors.lastname: Vanbergen
authors.affiliation: Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, Lancaster Environment Centre, Lancaster, Bailrigg LA1 4AP, UK.
authors.forename: Aidan
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Keith
authors.affiliation: Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, Lancaster Environment Centre, Lancaster, Bailrigg LA1 4AP, UK.
authors.forename: Heather
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Carter
authors.affiliation: Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, Lancaster Environment Centre, Lancaster, Bailrigg LA1 4AP, UK.
authors.forename: M Glória
authors.initials: MG
authors.lastname: Pereira
authors.affiliation: Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, Environment Centre Wales, Deiniol Rd, Bangor LL57 2UW, UK.
authors.forename: Steve
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Hughes
authors.affiliation: Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, Environment Centre Wales, Deiniol Rd, Bangor LL57 2UW, UK.
authors.forename: Inma
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Lebron
authors.affiliation: Dept of Geography, University of Reading, Whiteknights, PO, BOX 227 Reading, RG6 6AB, UK.
authors.forename: Andrew
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Wade
authors.affiliation: School of Environment, Natural Resources and Geography, Bangor University, Bangor, Gwynedd LL57 2UW, UK.
authors.forename: David L
authors.initials: DL
authors.lastname: Jones
keywords: Biodiversity; Carbon; Macronutrients; Productivity; Soil pH; Water quality