A one day meeting to celebrate long-term data was held in the Linnean Society rooms on 22nd October 2008. This was part of the celebrations of Marsham’s tercentenary. Robert Marsham 1708-1797 was a Norfolk landowner with a passion for trees and natural history and whose long life allowed him to make active records for over 60 years. Most famously he is known for his Indications of Spring, 27 phenological events (phenology is the study of the timing of recurring natural biotic events), which he started recording in 1736 and which were continued by successive members of his family until 1958.
The meeting was sponsored by the Linnean Society and the Centre for Ecology and Hydrology.
The audience of 65 were treated to nine talks from leaders in their fields and a panel discussion comprising the former Director of the British Trust for Ornithology, the former Chief Executive of the Environment Agency (and current President of the BTO), the Chief Scientist of Natural England and the Chair of the Ecological Continuity Trust.
Tim Sparks gave an introduction to Robert Marsham, emphasising the original contribution that a single recorder can make. The time series of phenological recordings that Marsham began has proved of immense value (J. Ecol, 83, 321-9) and can justifiably allow him to be called the "father" of modern phenology. Alastair Fitter produced a well balanced summary of the value of long-term data sets with a particular emphasis on the unforeseen uses to which they have been put, particularly now in regard to climate change. Of course, his father, the late Richard Fitter, made a substantial contribution to long term record keeping over seven decades of which the Fitter & Fitter Science paper (Science, 296, 1689-91) is a fitting tribute. Humphrey Crick made a whistlestop tour through phenology covering organisms as diverse as fungi, birds and brown bears. Long-term datasets have provided plenty of evidence of shifting phenology, particularly with respect to climate change in recent decades; scientific investigation must now focus on phenological mismatching and any problems that it may cause.
Chris Thomas produced some very solid examples of distributional changes in Britain across a wide range of species groups. Using examples of the rapid change in butterfly distributions he showed that some changes were a very good match to those predicted as a consequence of increased temperatures, although most species were lagging behind climate. John Harwood noted that population modelling was not possible without the benefit of long-term datasets. He forcibly argued for the benefits of Bayesian estimation in population modelling. He used examples of seal populations in his modelling and showed how integrated analysis of count data with information on reproduction and survival could substantially increase the precision around population trend analysis.
Richard Shore emphasised the value of long-term datasets for monitoring chemicals in the environment: archives of samples have proved very valuable for helping to understand the spread of pollutants that were unrecognised when the samples were collected. He illustrated his talk with pollutants recorded in birds of prey and particularly the current interest of rodenticides in barn owls. Tom Tew discussed the needs of a conservation organisation for long term data. He noted that it was vital not only to show how the natural environment was changing and for understanding the causes of change, but also for target setting and monitoring the success of conservation action. Simon Jennings discussed long term marine records and the difficulty of obtaining data relative to the terrestrial environment. The long-term plankton records for the UK have shown big shifts in distribution, phenology and abundance; again an unforeseen benefit of the original scheme. Tom Williamson wound up the talks for the day illustrating land use change from documented evidence and how this links to current field patterns and distribution of veteran trees. He warned that our perception of the past cannot always be borne out by the actual evidence and that substantial changes had happened, even in the relatively recent past, of which we are now completely unaware.
The meeting highlighted not only the crucial value of long-term datasets for ecological science but also for providing the evidence required to allow rational decision making by conservation policy makers. Britain is particularly well endowed with a wealth of long-term datasets and the discussion identified the urgent need for funders to support their maintenance, curation and archiving for posterity. The internet provides huge potential for increasing the availability and use of the datasets, but there are many challenges such as the need to promote similar standards for data storage.
Tim Sparks (CEH) and Humphrey Crick (Natural England)
Additional Information
Programme