Steve Ormerod

Over the last 30+ years, prominent themes in my work have been large-scale, long term impacts of global change on freshwater ecosystems as well as ecosystem recovery where such stressors have been managed or removed.

River ecosystem services have become an increasingly important focus in my work, in particular to understand how biodiversity supports services and how environmental stressors erode ecosystem functions and service delivery.

I became interested in the ecology of river-birds, and in particular dippers, while researching aquatic invertebrates for my PhD. This interest led to some of the world’s first evidence that birds could be affected by acid rain (eg Ormerod et al. 1991), and in turn some of the world’s best known autecological bird research. The concept of using dippers as indicators of acidity led also to research into their role as indicators of broader aspects of water quality that still continues.