| Key Achievements |
2014/15 (planned) |
2014/15 (actual) |
| Plant-soil interactions – Outcomes 1 and 2 |
$0.72 |
$0.77 |
- Improved understanding of the ecology and ecosystem impacts of wilding conifers, the scale of the issue, and the risks and opportunities for future management. This is being used by DOC and MPI to support a more detailed business case to manage these invaders.
- Demonstrated that more diverse pastures can increase productivity with fewer fertiliser inputs. This research is now being used by DairyNZ in their Whole Farm Model to determine how diverse pastures on farms can help to optimise milk production whilst minimising negative environmental effects.
- Led a major review on the impacts of climate change on soil services across primary sectors in New Zealand. This highlights that management and adaptation of primary sectors overwhelms the likely effects of climate change, and as such, is essential evidence for future policy response of primary sectors.
- Developed capability in applying novel techniques in geochemistry to understand the rate of soil formation and its turnover in complex landscapes. This provides fundamental tools for understanding the creation, maintenance and function of soils in the landscape.
- Initiated research to better integrate social research with traditional ecology and weed management to understand the non-market impacts of wilding conifers. This provides new mechanisms for understanding complex environmental issues, cultural values, the social context and impacts of wildings.
|
| Consequences of land use intensification – Outcomes 2 and 3 |
$0.92 |
$0.92 |
- Comparing emissions of greenhouse gases between new irrigated dairy pasture and neighbouring dryland pasture systems revealed that the irrigated pastures had more efficient water use and increased soil carbon. This helps the dairy industry understand how pasture management and weather affect carbon, water and nitrogen, and thus the balance between benefits to primary industry and environmental effects.
- Developed new capability to determine the potential for soil fungi to transform inorganic and organic nitrogen into nitrous oxide, carbon dioxide and di-nitrogen gases. This has the potential to regulate denitrification across scales and provide future tools for nutrient management.
|
| Soil processes – Outcome 2 |
$1.05 |
$1.06 |
- Evaluated microbial (e.g. E. coli) bypass flow into groundwater for 25 different soils that are prevalent under dairying. This information was used to generate a national map that can be used to better match land use to soil capability to filter contaminants.
- Compared nutrients in pasture, gorse shrublands and regenerating forest, and demonstrated that considerable increases in N leaching are likely from areas colonised by gorse, and that nutrient inputs by woody weeds on marginal lands should be included in nutrient budgets across scales.
- Generated fundamental knowledge of how nitrogen is immobilised or lost from soils through research on the ability of soil organic matter to buffer and filter nutrients (nitrogen). Our findings are being adopted to improve net N immobilisation estimation in the OVERSEER model, providing the basis for improved nutrient management across sectors.
- Deepened capability in soil biology and processes through determination of how microbial communities contribute to mechanisms of carbon and nitrogen cycling across soil types. This provides underpinning information about the function and services provided by soils, and may identify the biological mechanisms involved for future research or management.
- Surveyed end-user needs for a hydrological modelling platform that integrates soil data. Nitrogen and phosphorus dynamics were of most interest. This sets the direction for capability development linking soils data and nutrient cycling information with hydrological modelling.
|
| Ecosystem service forecasting – Outcome 2 |
$0.17 |
$0.17 |
- Developed forecasting models to demonstrate that wilding conifer invasion in the Mackenzie country could remove water equivalent to that required for irrigating over 16,000 hectares of agricultural land. This information will be extremely useful to DOC and MPI in developing a detailed business case for the management of wilding conifers.
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