Cairngorms
Address
UK Centre for Ecology and Hydrology (UKCEH )Bush Estate
Penicuik, Edinburgh, Midlothian
EH26 0QB
Scotland
Station manager
Christopher AndrewsE-mail: chan@ceh.ac.uk
Station Features
Opening year: 1998 Status: OpenFacilities
Station name and owner
The ECN Cairngorms site is owned by Scottish National Heritage, a Scottish government funded body that looks after Scotland's landscapes whilst research is managed by Centre for Ecology and Hydrology. ECN stands for the UK Environmental Change Network, and is the UK's long-term environmental monitoring and research programme. The ECN makes regular measurements of air, soil, water, and a range of animals and plants across a network of sites to determine how and why the natural environment is changing (see www.ecn.ac.uk for more information).
Location
The ECN Cairngorms site is a north facing granite catchment overlain with peat situated in the Cairngorms Mountains of Scotland (57°07'N, 03°49'W), rising from about 350 m a.s.l. through the tree line at 500 m a.s.l. to the highest summit at 1111 m a.s.l. The catchment area is 10 km2. The site is part of the Invereshie and Inshriach National Nature ­Reserve, and forms part of the Cairngorms National Park.
Climate data
Grey colours are WMO Climate Normals including maximum and minimum values. Blue colours are individual years.
Climate data for the stations where extracted via Copernicus Climate Data Store, from the global gridded reanalysis product: ERA5 monthly averaged data on single levels from 1940 to present. Description and source code: Roemer J.K. 2023. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.10214922 Data Source: Hersbach et al. 2023. Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S) Climate Data Store (CDS), https://doi.org/10.24381/cds.f17050d7
Biodiversity and natural environment
The catchment is composed of a wide range of ecosystems from pine forest at low altitude, through bog communities on ground with impeded drainage, to alpine vegetation including moss and lichen heaths on the highest ground. The charismatic capercaillie, a member of the grouse family (IUCN Red listed), is found in the pine woods along with pine martin. Several species of deer can be found grazing a variety of habitats from the forests to the summits. The site has virtually no natural tree line due to past overgrazing but is now being extensively re-colonised by Pinus sylvestris.
History and facilities
From the middle of the nineteenth century the site was mainly used as deer forest, as part of a large sporting estate in private ownership (Invereshie Estate). It became part of the Cairngorms National Nature Reserve in 1954. Ecological and environmental research has been undertaken in the area since the early 1960s, and the site joined the Environmental Change Network of the UK in 1998. There are no buildings on the site, but accommodation for a small number of visitors can be arranged on site (camping), and there are local hotels and guest houses nearby.
General research and databases
Research on the site includes both terrestrial and freshwater environmental monitoring as part of the ECN and also as part of the Austrian GLORIA programme (www.gloria.ac.at), examining temperature effects on vegetation across Alpine Europe. Intensive hydrological and snow related research took place in the early 1990s. The Cairngorms area has been the focus of many land use change and tourism impact studies since c. the 1980s, and the data is being used in current ecosystem service research.
Station Monitoring
Human dimension
The research site is uninhabited and used for recreation; hiking, trekking, and mountain biking. Aviemore, the nearest town, has a population of around 2500 and became one of the first skiing resorts to be established in Scotland with the opening of the chairlift in 1961. The resort has since grown into the UK's most visited ski resort during the winter months. In 2013, the national park became the first Long-Term Social-Ecological Research (LTSER) platform in the UK, providing a platform for linking ecological, social and economic research.
Access
The research site is close to Aviemore, which has good rail and bus services to Edinburgh (approximately 3 hours) and Inverness (less than an hour). A full suite of laboratory facilities are available at the Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, Edinburgh (CEH) located 10 km south of Edinburgh.
