Chris Stone talks to us about European Deserts.
Could you tell us a little about your background and what led you to write European Deserts?
Living in a former heathland village in past years, I was motivated by a deep curiosity to understand the world around me. I elected to study biology, ecology, geography and geology, as well as economic and social history. I was interested in how these foundational elements interacted and evolved to shape the sandy local environments I encountered.
Opting to study an integrative natural and social science degree subject was the right choice for me, and I graduated from one of the earliest British environment bachelor degree programmes. Securing my first professional role with the Suffolk Wildlife Trust provided an unparalleled opportunity. As part of a highly-qualified project team dedicated to conserving the dusty heathland deserts of rural east Suffolk, my colleagues and I launched the region’s first major heathland conservation project.
Travelling widely throughout rural Europe whenever I was able, I found myself drawn to the least-known rural regions of the subcontinent. In many locations I recognised more of these familiar tracts of sandy wilderness, and came to appreciate just how ubiquitous they were across the lowlands of this otherwise verdant subcontinent. Yet although individually and collectively they were of vital significance for biodiversity, landscape, and social and economic history, they were mostly unknown, unrecognised and certainly unappreciated. Many were clearly neglected, and many were in danger of being lost entirely.
Driven to better understand this intriguing phenomenon, I was surprised - and faintly bemused - to discover just how little scholarly attention Europe’s desertic tracts had attracted. Few, if any, scholars had investigated this remarkable environmental phenomenon in an interdisciplinary and geographically inclusive manner and at a subcontinental scale. I resolved to do so. There was a pressing need for a preliminary examination of these obscure and overlooked dusty territories. So: I commenced writing the book European Deserts: Sandy Wilderness on a Green Continent…!
Dutch desert dunes with stumps of former trees © Chris Stone
For those of us used to seeing Europe as lush and temperate, how do you define a ‘European desert’?
Europe is widely regarded as a lush, temperate continent. Two commonly cited criteria for identifying deserts are high temperatures and low rainfall. The Sahara is the largest and best-known example of a hot desert, and many people’s image of a desert is a hot, subtropical one. Yet many people are surprised to learn that there are thousands of deserts distributed across the planet from the equator to the poles. Many – or indeed most - are not hot but cool or cold, and many receive substantial rainfall. Like so many across the face of the planet, Europe’s deserts may be cold and rainy – yet they are deserts all the same, comparable to those found elsewhere on the planet. Given the task’s scale, complexity and the resources available, the book project necessarily adopted a pragmatic approach to identifying these dusty European tracts.
Over forty percent of Earth’s land area is considered arid. The European deserts share numerous characteristics with the planet’s subtropical desert regions. These are distinctive environments marked by extreme soil conditions where only sparse vegetation can survive. Substrates typically consist of soils which are poorly-developed or absent overlying layers of coarse, loose sand and other materials which are often extremely dry. In these free-draining and low-moisture environments, the liquid essential for most plant life to flourish is frequently unavailable. Rainfall seeping into the ground is rarely retained in the upper layers; instead, it drains rapidly downwards out of reach of most plant roots, unhindered by the humus-rich, well-structured layers typical of more developed soils.
Moreover, the nature of the substrate - mineral-dominated and heavily weathered - intensifies the already harsh and arid environmental conditions on these tracts. Nutrients are in short supply in these inherently infertile sandy soils. Lacking many of the essential chemical elements required to support life, these environments are incapable of sustaining rapid plant and animal growth, high biomass densities, a relatively diverse range of species and comparatively few higher plants. The challenges of soil infertility, combined with the relative scarcity of available moisture on the European deserts, are comparable to those in the world’s subtropical desert regions.
The prevailing climate may not be arid, but Europe’s deserts are distinctive landscapes shaped by relatively extreme conditions. The book focuses primarily on lowland heathland, and to a lesser degree Badlands. The term heathland encompasses a diverse range of relatively desertic habitats, including heather-dominated heath, grassland, and sparsely- and unvegetated lands. Better-known in north America, Badlands are scarce in Europe. These natural erosional features forming on soft or easily erodible rocks present an overall impression of extreme terrain. They are characterised by bare vistas of severe eroding, steeply dissected landscapes, gullies and ravines, and a lack of vegetation. Both of these types of relatively infertile and arid tracts are among the most extreme environments found on the subcontinent, yet remain largely unfamiliar to the general public.
These distinctive features set Europe’s dusty and parched ‘wasteland’ tracts apart from the more fertile landscapes within which they are located. Considered collectively, these cold deserts represent a shared European environmental heritage comparable to the world’s great arid regions, with examples of varying scale present in nearly every country across the subcontinent. Yet until now, they have rarely - if ever - been recognised as such.
Polish Sahara © Chris Stone
What was the most surprising thing you learnt whilst conducting research for the book?
The sheer scale of the European Deserts phenomenon! Discovering the full extent of these desolate yet remarkably biodiverse wildernesses scattered throughout the lowlands of green and fertile Europe was both exciting and inspiring. Another surprise was – once again – appreciating just how little had been written about these remarkable places, and notably the lack of accounts of the individuals and communities that historically subsisted on this inhospitable terrain. Finally, it was striking to find that those who lived in Europe’s desertic regions were historically relegated to a lowly station within rural society. Living on the worst and least valuable land, their inhabitants were impoverished in every sense, and although their farming products played a significant role in at least some regional economies, their peoples were commonly despised by respectable society, regarded as uncivilised at best and inherently criminal at worst.
Having explored remote tracts in countries ranging from Iceland to Romania, which of these locations was the most physically or scientifically challenging to document?
Like deserts the world over, these places are challenging locations in which to conduct research! It’s no coincidence that Europe’s deserts are mostly uninhabited… A recent field study trip to Pustynia Błędowska in southern Poland - the ‘Polish Sahara’ – proved extremely demanding. The high August temperatures and humidity of central Europe was made worse by clouds of abrasive sand and dust whipped up with every gust of hot summer breeze, and walking on the friable ground was a constant struggle.
The Błędowska desert, along with the majority of European deserts, is poorly documented. Reliably translating written material from Polish and five other European languages into English for each chapter of the book proved a continual challenge. Accessible information about the arid sand plains of the ‘Oltenian Sahara’ in southern Romania - a region I have yet to explore - was particularly scarce.
A cleared tract of bare sandy ground on Lüneburg Heath © Chris Stone
With your background in planning wildlife conservation for heathlands, how does European Deserts contribute to the current global conversation on rewilding and nature recovery?
Firstly simply by raising awareness of these obscure and neglected places and their diverse ecological, cultural, and historical significance. This constitutes part of the book’s original contribution to knowledge. Concepts of nature recovery and rewilding are beginning to dominate ecological conversations. Nature recovery is a term increasingly employed in UK environmental policy, with its links to a range of international initiatives including the United Nations Decade of Ecosystem Restoration 2021-2030. As David Attenborough has observed, “The British Isles are globally important for nature,” and the heathlands of Europe should be a nature conservation priority for their contribution to global biodiversity. With around 58 000 hectares of lowland heathland, the United Kingdom accounts for roughly 20% of the world’s total. These landscapes support a rich diversity of rare and endangered species, yet this important habitat is both scarce and threatened, and has arguably been neglected.
The concept of nature recovery is very relevant to Europe’s remaining desertic tracts. Large-scale action is needed to create and restore more wildlife-rich places that are bigger, better managed, and more joined-up. The book sets a goal to double the area of these lowland wildernesses across the subcontinent by 2050, while simultaneously enhancing the condition of existing tracts. Nature recovery projects are now in progress at numerous sites, yet the scale of the challenge is immense, and some precious sites continue to face development threats.
It remains uncertain whether the deserts of Europe have collectively gained broad recognition as a key element of the subcontinent’s indigenous terrestrial ecosystems. At present, many lack even a management plan. Nature recovery is best pursued through the development of a comprehensive pan-European vision statement, integrated with a strategic conservation plan at the biogeographical level which reflects the variability of these tracts across the subcontinent.
The concept of rewilding presents significant challenges when applied to European desert ecosystems. One interpretation of the term rewilding centres upon the withdrawal of human intervention. However, it is important to acknowledge that the heathland environment is a plagioclimax, sustaining biotic communities whose ecological succession has been arrested through direct human intervention. Allowing natural forest regeneration, for instance, may accelerate the loss of the scarce desertic flora and fauna that are confined to these remaining habitats. In fact, these landscapes are by no means unique in being extensively modified by human activity, as most environments in western Europe have undergone significant anthropogenic intervention for millennia. Active human intervention in the form of conservation management entails recurrent costs, but this is a price worth paying, and one accepted by the numerous nature recovery projects presently underway.
It’s not only about the wildlife, either. These tracts are primarily cultural landscapes, fascinating remnants of the subcontinent’s shared cultural heritage. Here one can encounter vistas that would have been familiar to humans of the Bronze Age, a tantalising glimpse of wide-open landscapes and low-intensity land uses which predate modern agriculture. In many locations, too, they are the only remaining tracts of wilderness amid intensively managed surroundings. Finally, since evolutionary adaptation within species to local environments is widespread in the natural world, the European deserts may constitute vital reservoirs of genetic resources that facilitate survival in arid environments.
Bardenas Reales badlands panorama © Chris Stone
Who is the target audience for European Deserts, and what do you hope readers will take away from the experience?
Published in both print and digital (eBook) formats, European Deserts breaks new ground in its exploration of some of Europe’s least-known landscapes. Inviting readers to view the subcontinent’s environment in a new light, the book appeals to two key readership segments: passionate subject specialists - naturalists, scientists, environmentalists, geographers and geologists (the work draws upon over 400 references); and curious explorers of the world, inquisitive and keen to understand the environment around them, and the nature, science, and rural history and societies that shaped these special places.
Readers will gain a fresh perspective on Europe’s environment. Thousands of deserts are scattered across the globe, from the equator to the poles, and a significant proportion are located in Europe, more usually recognised as a verdant part of the world. They may not look as attractive or even as familiar as other seminatural habitats, but they provide home range for numerous scarce and endangered species. Also, their continuing existence reaffirms a fundamental proposition: the dominance of the planet’s physical environment over the human.
The book seeks to foster a deeper appreciation of the character, value, and aesthetic beauty of these lowland wildernesses, highlighting both their ecological and cultural significance. Many are remote and uninhabited, yet some are to be found unexpectedly close to population centres, where the ecological and cultural value of these dusty and neglected ‘wastelands’ is often overlooked or only poorly understood. Moreover, this richly illustrated book conveys that many or most of these remarkable environments face significant threats. Ensuring their long-term conservation should be a priority to protect and enhance their crucial contribution to the biodiversity of Europe – and, more broadly, of the planet.
Finally, the inquisitive will be inspired to seek out the nearest example of the European deserts phenomenon – whether that’s Hampstead, Lüneburg, Kootwijkerzand, Błędowska, Bardenas Reales, or somewhere closer to home – and savour sweeping vistas of native wilderness where tranquility reigns supreme. Europe has deserts.
Order your copy of European Deserts here.
