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Wednesday 27 April 2016

We are go!

We are excited to confirm that the first of many rainshelters for the RainDrop Experiment is in the ground.


After years of planning; from identifying a gap in the UK's long-term experiment (LTE) platform back in 2008, to a change in location from Parsonage Down to Wytham Woods, we are thrilled to see installation underway.

This is no mean feat and is only possible due to the fantastic partnerships that have been forged between the Ecological Continuity Trust, Oxford University, the Open University and the Patsy Wood Trust. Construction will require the assembly of in excess of 10,000 individual components, a process that is being overseen by PhD student Melanie Stone, Dr. Kadmiel Maseyk and Professor David Gowing (all from the Open University).

Construction underway on site


This is a really exciting project that will enable researchers to look at the effects of future climate change on semi-natural calcareous grassland.  By using a combination of rainshelters and solar-powered irrigation systems, the experiment will investigate how changes in the rainfall regime will affect the grassland community.



The two main treatments to be applied to plots are reduced rainfall (-50% on ambient levels) and increased rainfall (+50% on ambient levels). These will sit alongside control plots that receive ambient levels of rainfall and have no equipment installed, and procedural control plots which have rainshelters installed but which allow the rain to fall through to the ground beneath, and are designed to monitor any non-target environmental effects of the installed equipment.

RainDrop is intended as a new national research platform; within each experimental block there are currently four free plots to allow for further expansion of the experiment.