Priority Habitats: Lake Restoration Priorities

Priority habitats form part of the UK’s commitment to the International Convention on Biodiversity. Each country who signed up to to the Convention is required to define a range of habitats (and individual species) where action is a priority to protect and restore biodiversity, and then to take the necessary action. The UK’s list of priority habitats includes both river and lake habitats. Existing nationally generated maps of river/stream and lake restoration priorities are now being refined with stakeholders to become a mechanism for highlighting local priorities for different sorts of restoration of natural habitat function – hydrological, physical, chemical and biological. Any site that falls under the UK river and lake priority habitat definitions (which essentially means any river, stream or lake), and therefore warrants specific consideration, can be highlighted as a priority for restoration action, if the action restores natural function. 15 different measures for the restoration of natural habitat function are included within the lake restoration priorities layer. These are: Physical Restoration Establish/restore riparian zone of semi-natural vegetation Restore natural lake shorelines Restore littoral margins including marginal emergent vegetation where lost Remove outflow structures where these do not result in the loss of the water body Hydrological Restoration Restore natural water-level fluctuations Manage water-level regime to reflect natural water level fluctuations Remove artificial drainage from the riparian zone Restore natural inflows Restore natural outflows Chemical Restoration Address point sources of pollution Address diffuse pollution Remove nutrient-rich sediments (for shallow lakes) Biological Restoration Control non-native species Reduce the intensity of or halt fish stocking Restore natural biological assemblages e.g. through biomanipulation See the Priority Habitat data portal for more information on priority river (including streams) and lake habitats in England, how you can get involved in their protection and restoration, and in particular how you can provide information on the sites you visit to help prioritise conservation action. Other parts of the UK have their own approaches to conserving priority habitats as part of their separate biodiversity strategies.