The landscape with its associated historical tracks and remains are an important part of our cultural heritage that we consider important to conserve. The stone walls are an example of historical remains that helps to build up this cultural heritage. It is a landscape element that today usually is being associated with the old cultivated landscape, where they mainly functioned as boundary markings and fences. Today, the stone wall is a valuable element in the landscape with ecological, culture-historical and aesthetic values. Since the stone walls arose as elements in the landscape a lot has been changed within the agriculture.

This work broadly illuminates the conditions for increasing the commissions of forestry services within the whole, or parts of, the western regions of Stora Enso?s operating area. Through a questionnaire, a survey was made examining whether the owners of the forests themselves do the forestry on their woodlands. This foremost concerns the pre-commercial thinning, but also planting and soil scarification. The survey also shows who are buying the most part of their forestry services and who are carrying it out themselves.

There are two species of voles that cause damage in Swedish fruit production: the water vole (Arvicola terrestris) and the field vole (Microtus agrestis). Both species make the most damage during the winter season. The water vole makes subterranean burrows and cause serious damage by gnawing on the tree roots. The field vole seldom makes burrows and gnaws the bark at the base of the tree trunk. In recent years there have been several reports about increasing vole damage.

Högbytorp is Ragn-Sells? largest waste facility and it is located north of Stockholm. There is an old landfill still in use, but at the end of this year it will be closed. The waste deposited on the landfill can, through decomposition, give rise to a large amount of methane gas, which is an energy rich gas that can be used for heat and electricity production. To receive a relatively large amount of gas, the decomposition requires a high moisture content in the waste.

This thesis investigated the possibilities to resume cultivation of an old manor house built of timber and what this would mean from an energy and moisture perspective. The building in this case study is named Sofiedals mansion and was built in 1858 in Valbo 11 kilometers west of Gävle.The structure of the house was documented and used as a starting-point for carrying out calculations focused on energy and moisture aspects. With the help of a number of computer programs and a conducted air tightness test, the buildings energy consumption were calculated and compared with the current building regulations.In addition, the building was analyzed considering energy retrofitting and what it meant for moisture problems. The energy retrofitting consisted of additional insulation, decreasing the buildings permeability through air sealing; window and door replacements. When a building is equipped with natural ventilation it is difficult to know its precise performance and how an energy retrofitting affects it.

This is a literature review of how the climate change affects the forest growth innorthern Sweden. The temperature will rise about 5 °C with the largest increase in thewinter season (December - February) and the CO2level in the atmosphere is expected tobe doubled. Precipitation patterns will change and increase with 25-35 % and theprecipitation will be in form of rain rather than snow. Today the forests in northernSweden are entirely dominated by coniferous stands. This may shift with the climatechange and results in a larger number of deciduous trees, preferably birch will becomestronger and grow better and faster.

Trees in urban environment are exposed to extreme conditions, foremost the ones that grow in the hard packed soil along our streets. They are also exposed to damaging insects and fungal diseases both local and new ones spreading from South Europe. The global warming with warmer temperatures provides a longer growing season, making it easier for insects and fungus to establish a habitat. Based on these facts new tree species need to be available for future urban plantings.To determine what these trees would be an interview study began. Six people were selected who have experience in the field of urban environment planting.

The first regulation concerning the protection of shores was introduced in 1950. The purpose of that regulation was to "secure the general publics condition of an outdoor life". The protection has been sharpened over the years and in 1975 a general protection of the shores was introduced, which meant that all land was protected within 100 meters from the shoreline. In 1994 a supplement was made with the purpose to "preserve good conditions for animal and plants on land and in water". The Swedish Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) did an inquiry of the shore protection regulations commissioned by the Government in 2001. The inquiry pointed out that there were big lacks in the exemption decisions.

Most of the sea areas within the European Union are overfished and the catches are estimated to be up to five times lager then the amount to achieve a sustainable fishery. In doing so, the management of EU's marine resources comes to be questioned. The purpose of this study was to analyze EU's administration of marine fisheries and to explore which steps that can be undertaken to counteract the negative trend. The questions of the study were: How does the EU administrate today?s marine fishery recourses? And: How can the problem whit overfishing be discouraged? To answer these questions a comparative analyses were used to compare and evaluate administrative systems.

Eutrophication was recognized in the early 1900's and results in severe algal blooms, increased biomass production and eventually leads to an altered ecosystem. In Mälardalen we find the most eutrophic lakes. Most of the applied phosphorus and nitrogen into seas and oceans comes from agriculture, and the nutrients losses are affected by local weather conditions and soil type. Guidelines for storage and distribution of manure were introduced in the 80s, and the rules were strengthened January 1, 2010. Localities and previous county administrations can whether there are special reasons, grant an exemption for manure application during winter-periods despite the current ban.In this essay I have examined how many exemptions of manure application that has been granted at the Sagån river, and what implications it has for the eutrophication of Lake Mälaren.

Russian comfrey, Symphytum x uplandicum, was tested as a plant nutrient source in a trial with tomatoes. Comfrey liquid was produced by Stiftelsen Holma i Höör. Tomato plants of the cultivar Aromata planted in a medium of soil:peat (1:1) enriched with organic nutrients and lime, were fed with comfrey liquid plus Biofer, in three different concentrations. Two different concentrations of BioRika were used as comparison, along with an unfertilized control group. In the comfrey treatment I a total amont of 1g N, 0,23 g P, 0,84 g K, was given to the tomatoes.

Längs Afrikas östkust från Somalia till Mozambique löper en tropisk skogsremsa som uppvisar en fantastisk variation i artsammansättning och utgör habitat för en mängd endemiska arter. Regionen är så unik att både Conservation International och WWF anser att den bör prioriteras för bevarande insatser. De kustnära skogarna erbjuder också en mängd tjänster som många människor är beroende av. Skog förhindrar jorderosion, är hem åt pollinatorer och lagrar upp koldioxid. Mangroveskogar stabiliserar kustområden och de för lokalbefolkningen heliga Kaya-skogarna i södra Kenya erbjuder ett kulturellt värde. Den stora befolkningen som lever i området gör att mänsklig påverkan utgör ett betydande hot mot regionens biologiska mångfald. Det största hotet utgör det växande jordbruket som ska försörja en allt större befolkning.

This essay deals with ruins from the perspective of their cultural values ??and the impact of add-ons, protective add-ons and caring actions affect these values. The issues in the essay are; What are the cultural values of a ruin?  How have ruins been used?  How are ruins treated today?Initially the definition of the concept ?ruin? is discussed, what is a ruin? A building has an architectural biography: the creation, destruction, change and the decay. The concept of ruin is considered to be a state of this decay, rather than a dead building.

A common perception is that fungicide treatments increases yield, but that the nitrogen of the particular grain is diluted so that the overall removal of grain nitrogen from the field remains unchanged. The aim of this paper is to demonstrate that a healthy crop reduces the risk of nutrient loss from agricultural land. The results from genotype and plant protection trials often show constant nitrogen content in the grain, although the yield has been increased. Results from such experiments are therefore processed in order to confirm this and show that it is no statistically significant difference between the protein content (and also nitrogen content) in crops which have undergone fungicide treatment compared to crops which remained untreated. The trials processed have been carried out in the southernmost part of Sweden and are distinguished to concern winter wheat production.The explanation to the results is that a healthy crop is able to maintain the biological functions of the plant in a more efficient way than a crop damaged by a fungal infection.

Forestry has three main aspects to take into consideration today; economical, ecological and socio-cultural. In order to reach the broad policy goals for sustainable forest management, an increased variety of management approaches are requested. Today clear-cutting is the only method used in 96 % of the managed forests in Sweden. The Swedish National Board of Forestry has therefore initiated a project in order to investigate and develop Continuous Cover Forestry (CFF). This study is a part of this project.