Tilda Tarrant

I am a PhD student investigating biodiversity patterns in forest and peatland ecosystems undergoing nature restoration. I’m fascinated by soil biodiversity and in 2023, I completed my MSc in Environmental Biology at Utrecht University where I specialised in the interactions between plants and soil microbes. Here, I developed a keen interest in the role of soil biodiversity in wider landscape patterns, especially in a nature restoration context. Subsequently, I have worked on a project with ARK Rewilding in the Netherlands to assess the use of Sentinel-2 satellite imagery in quantifying soil moisture patterns in a rewilded grassland ecosystem.

 In this PhD, my research will focus on the spatial and temporal biodiversity patterns in forest and peatland restoration sites, using a combination of environmental DNA testing and remote sensing techniques. The aim is to create efficient methodologies for monitoring biodiversity shifts in an ecosystem that can be easily replicated and implemented by land managers. I will work to monitor biodiversity patterns on sites across Scotland owned and managed by the Forests & Peatlands Programme (FPP) of the University of Edinburgh, as well as some other areas made available through partnerships. Furthermore, we hope to establish a baseline dataset that can be added to over the coming decades, allowing FPP to quantify and evidence the long-term impacts of woodland creation and peatland restoration on biodiversity across a range of kingdoms.

 This is an interdisciplinary project conducted between the Conservation Genetics department of the Royal (Dick) School of Veterinary Studies and the Centre for Sustainable Forests and Landscapes of the School of Geosciences. The project is funded by the University of Edinburgh through the FPP. I am supervised by Prof. Rob Ogden and Dr. Iain McNicol.