1:10 000) and were geo-statistically analysed using ArcGIS-ArcInfo software, v. 9.2 (ESRI 2006–2009) and the program Fragstats 3.0 (McGarigal et al. 2002). Intersecting the two vector layers allowed demarcating areas where historically-old www.selleckchem.com/products/psi-7977-gs-7977.html meadows persisted, new meadows had been created, and historical meadows had been replaced by other Belnacasan price habitat types. Habitat fragmentation analysis examined the area covered by the target

meadow types in historical and recent times. For each study area and time period, individual grid maps (4 m × 4 m resolution) were produced illustrating the spatial distribution of (1) wet meadows, (2) species-rich mesic meadows, and (3) the combined area of the two meadow types. The grids were imported to Fragstats 3.0 and the following class-level landscape metrics were calculated: percentage

of the landscape (PLAND) covered by a given habitat type, number of patches (NP), patch density (PD), area-weighted mean of patch size (AM), total class area (CA) and effective mesh size (MESH) equalling the sum of patch area squared, summed across all patches of the corresponding patch type and divided by the total landscape area. For MESH, AM and total extent, Ipatasertib ic50 the significance of changes between the two time periods was tested by a Wilcoxon-test for pair-wise differences using R-software (R Development Core Team 2010). Results Changes in the extent of floodplain meadows In the six unprotected study areas, wet and species-rich mesic meadows declined enormously between the 1950/1960s and 2008 (differences significant at p ≤ 0.05; Fig. 2, Table 2). On average, wet meadows lost 85.2% of their former area, and species-rich mesic meadows decreased by 83.6%. Wet meadows were nearly completely lost at the Weser and the Luppe with <5 ha remaining, while species-rich

SSR128129E mesic meadows were reduced to about 8 ha. In the largest study area (Helme), a 83% loss led to a remaining wet meadow area of 100.3 ha, of which 77.5 ha were historically old and 22.8 ha were newly created after 1969. The Helme floodplain also harbours at present the largest area of species-rich mesic meadows (12.3 ha), of which 8.3 ha were newly created. The current extent of wet meadows in the Havel protected area was comparatively large (100.8 ha), but only about a third was historically old. While wet meadows at the Havel declined only slightly during the past decades (by 7.4%), the loss of species-rich mesic meadows was substantial (54.3%). Fig. 2 Areas of wet meadows (black) and species-rich mesic meadows (grey) in two of the seven study areas a Ems, b Havel, in the 1950/1960s and in 2008.