Expanding the open: Exploring the deep-time interface between natural and anthropogenic drivers in the heathlands of post-glacial northern Europe

Michelle Farrell & Mette Løvschal

Calluna heathlands once connected extensive areas of northern Europe. They often survived for several millennia, being some of the most persistent inter-regional ecologies known from late prehistoric times. Heathlands occur naturally on acidic, nutrient-poor soils, but can also be initiated and maintained by anthropogenic activity. Often viewed as unproductive ‘wastes, their value to human communities is not widely recognised, raising questions relating to their deep-time persistence dynamics, and how and why people managed to sustain these deeply unstable ecologies for >5000 years. 

We present a new pollen-based synthesis of heathland emergence, expansion and persistence in post-glacial northern Europe. We discuss (pre-)historical differences between naturally occurring Calluna abundances and propagation of anthropogenic heathlands as a wider social, economic and cultural phenomenon; including how much human intervention is needed for heathlands to expand under conditions where they are not naturally occurring, and the anthropogenic processes required for heathlands to persist over millennia. We show that while natural conditions such as soil and climate can explain the post-glacial regional distribution of Calluna, they cannot account for the timing of heathland expansion, and heathlands sometimes persist under sub-optimal conditions. In these cases, we suggest that structures of collaboration and entrapment dynamics must be considered.

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