PROJECT DESCRIPTION
BACKGROUND
The valley of the river Dijle south of Leuven has long been a bone of contention between nature conservation and flood prevention. Here the valley is relatively narrow, and contains valuable wet hay meadows, sedge complexes, ponds and, along the edges, small alder swamp forests. However, the implementation of strategies to boost agricultural output lessened the valley's natural capacity to retain floodwaters, so that the more low-lying sections of the city of Leuven were flooded whenever water levels peaked. For decades, demands were voiced by local political bodies to build a large retention basin, but, as this would threaten the ecological qualities of the valley (promoted to SPA in the meantime), local conservation bodies questioned this option. Instead, they developed an alternative plan based on natural retention and succeeded in winning over the competent regional authorities. Simultaneously, as a result of the Common Agricultural Policy's milk quotas, the pasture-based dairy farms were disappearing from this district, which was threatening to become exclusively arable. This would be fatal for the grassland habitats in this SPA, which had moreover, because of its valuable hay meadows and associated valley biotopes, also been proposed as SCI, and as a component of the Flemish ecological network.
OBJECTIVES
The purpose of the project was to restore the natural retention capacity of the area and give an impetus to the complete restoration of the alluvial valley habitats. As first priority, land would be purchased. Once these purchases had been done, additional financing (parallel to LIFE-Nature) would be deployed by the competent authority for river catchments (AMINAL - Afdeling Water) to carry out the hydrological engineering works, such as the removal of a culvert under the Ijsse river and filling of the Leigracht drainage ditch, needed to restore the natural retention capacity of the river. This, it was intended, would liberate the inhabitants of Leuven from the periodic floodings - a win-win situation, which could be a model for others. To restore the grassland habitats, the LIFE-Nature project would remove poplar plantations and sow former arable land with seed mixtures taken from the local hay meadows. The banks of the ponds to be purchased would be excavated to make room for reed fringes, to give a chance for the bittern and the little bittern, which both disappeared as breeding bird in the 1980s, to return.
RESULTS
The project achieved two main results. It contributed towards the work by the competent authorities to reinstate a more natural flooding regime in the Dijle valley, which would increase water retention upstream and so prevent flooding in Leuven. It secured and restored large coherent blocks of land to Annex I habitat status, by removing poplar plantations, weekend cottages, overgrowth etc, re-modelling former fishponds and installing appropriate recurring management - partly in close collaboration with local farmers via a direct marketing scheme for environmentally sound produce. Hydrology and vegetation had been mapped before the project began. Building on this comprehensive eco-hydrological assessment of the valley, a management plan was produced by the project covering all land within the Doode Bemde perimeter of 500 ha, whether it was owned by the beneficiary or not. This is quite innovative in comparison to the traditional Natuurpunt management plans, which only cover land owned by the NGO. The target set in the management plan is to have 50-60% open land (grassland, swamp, pond) and the rest as succession landscape evolving to ash-alder woods. Land purchase targets changed markedly during the project, as the competent authorities began acquiring land originally earmarked for purchase by the beneficiary. 54.3 ha was bought by Natuurpunt within the LIFE project - mostly former grasslands planted with poplars or overgrown as a result of abandonment, fish ponds and patches of degraded woodland. In parallel there were other land acquisition initiatives: 44.8 ha was expropriated by the competent authorities (AMINAL-Natuur and AMINAL-Water) and leased to Natuurpunt to manage, while a VLM (agri-structural authority) project for nature rehabilitation acquired another 10 ha which was also leased to Natuurpunt to manage. So altogether during the LIFE project over 109 ha came under conservation control. The beneficiary now owns or manages the most important 'depression areas’ in the project area. These are the Doode Bemde, the Dijlebroek-Leigracht area and the Grote Bron, the depression zone with the Langerodevijver. Before the LIFE project Natuurpunt only managed 99 ha (20% of the project area), this has now gone up to 208 ha (42% of the project area), mainly in large coherent blocks. The land purchase and acquisition allowed the competent authority (AMINAL-Water) to block a culvert bringing a drainage ditch (the Leigracht) under the IJsse river. This action, done parallel to LIFE, allowed the retention zone to fulfill its natural function. Since then, the drainage of the alluvial woods has stopped and wintertime flooding of the Dijle valley in the project area has started again. The project itself undertook an extensive list of one-off restoration works. - Whereas 20 ha were foreseen, in total 43 ha poplars have been removed by the LIFE project. On 18 ha of this, stumps were totally removed as well. - Four weekend cottages were demolished. - 4 ha maize field was converted into extensively managed grassland, 7.6 ha of production grassland was restored to Annex I habitat status by appropriate recurring mowing and grazing and shrubby overgrowth removed to restore 3.4 ha of former habitats for the benefit of the species Vertigo moulinsiana. - 4 km fences were installed to expand grazing management: 10 ha of the Doode Bemde is now managed by grazing and 40 ha by hay mowing followed by grazing. This recurring management is done by local farmers. - The banks of the 24 ha Langerode pond were cleared of trees and bushes and graded in order to stimulate reed growth. A small pond was restored in order to act as amphibian habitat and as a nature education site. - 5 ha of degraded woods were taken out of use and poplars ring-barked to provide standing dead wood. 400 metres of ditch draining the Langerode wood was filled in. This work was done by own staff (4 labourers were hired), a local employment initiative for disadvantaged youth and volunteers (regular camps were organised). Equipment was bought for the staff and volunteers using LIFE funds (tractor, trailer, shredder). The beneficiary and its partner, the NGO Vrienden van Heverleebos en Meerdaalwoud, are working closely with local farmers on recurring management – the farmers market the meat from their grazing livestock through a local cooperative, Veeakker cvba, as “nature meat”, thereby getting premium prices. This collaboration is one of the case studies in the LIFE-Focus report “LIFE and agri-environment supporting Natura 2000”. In terms of PR and awareness raising, and to channel the growing recreational use of the area, the following was done: - A folder ‘Welkom in de Doode Bemde’ explaining LIFE and the project, was distributed door-to-door in surrounding villages. - Open door day of May 30 1999, to which 1800 people came. - 6 information panels, a 300 m boardwalk, a hide and two bird observation huts were installed on site. - To create a trail across the site, an old tramway was cleared. The footbridge needed to cross the river was built by the Belgian military (Ecole du Génie) as goodwill gesture. The LIFE project was active in networking. The LIFE-Nature projects Obere Drau (Austria) and Alzette (Luxemburg) visited the site, as well as the Dutch NGO Natuurmonumenten involved in several LIFE projects. The project was presented to an international symposium on water retention (Leiden, 2001) and collaborated with a research project by the University of Cardiff on the role of LIFE in Natura 2000 sites. There were also contacts with the Schelde Convention.