Tim Burt

Durham University | DU · Department of Geography

The oxidative ratio (OR) of the terrestrial biosphere is directly related to the size of the terrestrial biosphere carbon sink. In turn, OR of naturally occurring organic matter can be directly related to the oxidation state of the carbon in naturally occurring organic matter (Cox). Chemical oxygen demand (COD) is a widely measured water quality pa...

We consider how the stoichiometry and energy content of organic matter reservoirs and fluxes through and from a peatland enable the fluxes and storage of carbon within a peatland to be constrained. We include the elemental composition of the above‐ and below‐ground biomass, litter, the peat profile, and the dissolved and particulate organic matter...

Ecosystem health and water quality of rivers are dependent on their temperature. With ongoing human‐induced climate change causing increases in air temperature across the globe, it is anticipated the stream temperatures will rise too ‐ in turn increasing the rates of biogeochemical stream processes and potentially threatening the viability and heal...

Weather records have been kept at Durham University Observatory in north-east England for almost 180 years—one of the longest single-site meteorological records in western Europe and the longest in northern England. This book celebrates and publishes the long Durham record, describes and explains the annual pattern of weather, and places the Durham...

We explore the oft-repeated claim that river water quality in Great Britain is “better now than at any time since the Industrial Revolution”. We review available data and ancillary evidence for seven different categories of water pollutants: (i) biochemical oxygen demand (BOD) and ammonia; (ii) heavy metals; (iii) sewage-associated organic pollutan...

This chapter reviews the various developments in Geomorphology in terms of institutions, journals, textbooks, research stations, etc. Among the institutions discussed are: the Binghamton Geomorphology Symposium, the Geological Society of America Quaternary Geology and Geomorphology Division, the Association of American Geographers Geomorphology Spe...

Weather records have been kept at Durham University Observatory in north-east England for almost 180 years—one of the longest single-site meteorological records in western Europe and the longest in northern England. This book celebrates and publishes the long Durham record, describes and explains the annual pattern of weather, and places the Durham...

Weather records have been kept at Durham University Observatory in north-east England for almost 180 years—one of the longest single-site meteorological records in western Europe and the longest in northern England. This book celebrates and publishes the long Durham record, describes and explains the annual pattern of weather, and places the Durham...

Weather records have been kept at Durham University Observatory in north-east England for almost 180 years—one of the longest single-site meteorological records in western Europe and the longest in northern England. This book celebrates and publishes the long Durham record, describes and explains the annual pattern of weather, and places the Durham...

Weather records have been kept at Durham University Observatory in north-east England for almost 180 years—one of the longest single-site meteorological records in western Europe and the longest in northern England. This book celebrates and publishes the long Durham record, describes and explains the annual pattern of weather, and places the Durham...

Weather records have been kept at Durham University Observatory in north-east England for almost 180 years—one of the longest single-site meteorological records in western Europe and the longest in northern England. This book celebrates and publishes the long Durham record, describes and explains the annual pattern of weather, and places the Durham...

Weather records have been kept at Durham University Observatory in north-east England for almost 180 years—one of the longest single-site meteorological records in western Europe and the longest in northern England. This book celebrates and publishes the long Durham record, describes and explains the annual pattern of weather, and places the Durham...

Weather records have been kept at Durham University Observatory in north-east England for almost 180 years—one of the longest single-site meteorological records in western Europe and the longest in northern England. This book celebrates and publishes the long Durham record, describes and explains the annual pattern of weather, and places the Durham...

Weather records have been kept at Durham University Observatory in north-east England for almost 180 years—one of the longest single-site meteorological records in western Europe and the longest in northern England. This book celebrates and publishes the long Durham record, describes and explains the annual pattern of weather, and places the Durham...

Weather records have been kept at Durham University Observatory in north-east England for almost 180 years—one of the longest single-site meteorological records in western Europe and the longest in northern England. This book celebrates and publishes the long Durham record, describes and explains the annual pattern of weather, and places the Durham...

Weather records have been kept at Durham University Observatory in north-east England for almost 180 years—one of the longest single-site meteorological records in western Europe and the longest in northern England. This book celebrates and publishes the long Durham record, describes and explains the annual pattern of weather, and places the Durham...

Weather records have been kept at Durham University Observatory in north-east England for almost 180 years—one of the longest single-site meteorological records in western Europe and the longest in northern England. This book celebrates and publishes the long Durham record, describes and explains the annual pattern of weather, and places the Durham...

Weather records have been kept at Durham University Observatory in north-east England for almost 180 years—one of the longest single-site meteorological records in western Europe and the longest in northern England. This book celebrates and publishes the long Durham record, describes and explains the annual pattern of weather, and places the Durham...

Weather records have been kept at Durham University Observatory in north-east England for almost 180 years—one of the longest single-site meteorological records in western Europe and the longest in northern England. This book celebrates and publishes the long Durham record, describes and explains the annual pattern of weather, and places the Durham...

Weather records have been kept at Durham University Observatory in north-east England for almost 180 years—one of the longest single-site meteorological records in western Europe and the longest in northern England. This book celebrates and publishes the long Durham record, describes and explains the annual pattern of weather, and places the Durham...

Weather records have been kept at Durham University Observatory in north-east England for almost 180 years—one of the longest single-site meteorological records in western Europe and the longest in northern England. This book celebrates and publishes the long Durham record, describes and explains the annual pattern of weather, and places the Durham...

Weather records have been kept at Durham University Observatory in north-east England for almost 180 years—one of the longest single-site meteorological records in western Europe and the longest in northern England. This book celebrates and publishes the long Durham record, describes and explains the annual pattern of weather, and places the Durham...

Weather records have been kept at Durham University Observatory in north-east England for almost 180 years—one of the longest single-site meteorological records in western Europe and the longest in northern England. This book celebrates and publishes the long Durham record, describes and explains the annual pattern of weather, and places the Durham...

Weather records have been kept at Durham University Observatory in north-east England for almost 180 years—one of the longest single-site meteorological records in western Europe and the longest in northern England. This book celebrates and publishes the long Durham record, describes and explains the annual pattern of weather, and places the Durham...

Weather records have been kept at Durham University Observatory in north-east England for almost 180 years—one of the longest single-site meteorological records in western Europe and the longest in northern England. This book celebrates and publishes the long Durham record, describes and explains the annual pattern of weather, and places the Durham...

Weather records have been kept at Durham University Observatory in north-east England for almost 180 years—one of the longest single-site meteorological records in western Europe and the longest in northern England. This book celebrates and publishes the long Durham record, describes and explains the annual pattern of weather, and places the Durham...

Weather records have been kept at Durham University Observatory in north-east England for almost 180 years—one of the longest single-site meteorological records in western Europe and the longest in northern England. This book celebrates and publishes the long Durham record, describes and explains the annual pattern of weather, and places the Durham...

Weather records have been kept at Durham University Observatory in north-east England for almost 180 years—one of the longest single-site meteorological records in western Europe and the longest in northern England. This book celebrates and publishes the long Durham record, describes and explains the annual pattern of weather, and places the Durham...

Weather records have been kept at Durham University Observatory in north-east England for almost 180 years—one of the longest single-site meteorological records in western Europe and the longest in northern England. This book celebrates and publishes the long Durham record, describes and explains the annual pattern of weather, and places the Durham...

Weather records have been kept at Durham University Observatory in north-east England for almost 180 years—one of the longest single-site meteorological records in western Europe and the longest in northern England. This book celebrates and publishes the long Durham record, describes and explains the annual pattern of weather, and places the Durham...

Weather records have been kept at Durham University Observatory in north-east England for almost 180 years—one of the longest single-site meteorological records in western Europe and the longest in northern England. This book celebrates and publishes the long Durham record, describes and explains the annual pattern of weather, and places the Durham...

Weather records have been kept at Durham University Observatory in north-east England for almost 180 years—one of the longest single-site meteorological records in western Europe and the longest in northern England. This book celebrates and publishes the long Durham record, describes and explains the annual pattern of weather, and places the Durham...

Weather records have been kept at Durham University Observatory in north-east England for almost 180 years—one of the longest single-site meteorological records in western Europe and the longest in northern England. This book celebrates and publishes the long Durham record, describes and explains the annual pattern of weather, and places the Durham...

Weather records have been kept at Durham University Observatory in north-east England for almost 180 years—one of the longest single-site meteorological records in western Europe and the longest in northern England. This book celebrates and publishes the long Durham record, describes and explains the annual pattern of weather, and places the Durham...

Weather records have been kept at Durham University Observatory in north-east England for almost 180 years—one of the longest single-site meteorological records in western Europe and the longest in northern England. This book celebrates and publishes the long Durham record, describes and explains the annual pattern of weather, and places the Durham...

Weather records have been kept at Durham University Observatory in north-east England for almost 180 years—one of the longest single-site meteorological records in western Europe and the longest in northern England. This book celebrates and publishes the long Durham record, describes and explains the annual pattern of weather, and places the Durham...

Weather records have been kept at Durham University Observatory in north-east England for almost 180 years—one of the longest single-site meteorological records in western Europe and the longest in northern England. This book celebrates and publishes the long Durham record, describes and explains the annual pattern of weather, and places the Durham...

Weather records have been kept at Durham University Observatory in north-east England for almost 180 years—one of the longest single-site meteorological records in western Europe and the longest in northern England. This book celebrates and publishes the long Durham record, describes and explains the annual pattern of weather, and places the Durham...

Weather records have been kept at Durham University Observatory in north-east England for almost 180 years—one of the longest single-site meteorological records in western Europe and the longest in northern England. This book celebrates and publishes the long Durham record, describes and explains the annual pattern of weather, and places the Durham...

Weather records have been kept at Durham University Observatory in north-east England for almost 180 years—one of the longest single-site meteorological records in western Europe and the longest in northern England. This book celebrates and publishes the long Durham record, describes and explains the annual pattern of weather, and places the Durham...

Weather records have been kept at Durham University Observatory in north-east England for almost 180 years—one of the longest single-site meteorological records in western Europe and the longest in northern England. This book celebrates and publishes the long Durham record, describes and explains the annual pattern of weather, and places the Durham...

We hypothesize that peatlands represent a cool humid island in their landscape context and that this cool humid island effect could be brought about by successful peatland restoration. This study used 20 years of Earth observation data for land surface temperature (day‐ and night‐ time LST), albedo (near infra‐red white sky albedo) and vegetation i...

Biochemical oxygen demand (BOD) has been taken as a measure of the lability of the fluvial organic matter (both dissolved and particulate organic matter—DOM and POM), but such a link is based on a number of assumptions. First, the oxidation state of the organic carbon is zero and the molar stoichiometry of the reaction between organic C and O2 is 1...

This chapter reviews research on solutes by fluvial geomorphologists in the period 1965 to 2000; growing links with biogeochemical research are emphasised later in the chapter. Brief reference is necessarily made to some research from before and after the study period. In relation to solutes, early research sought to relate short-term process obser...

The study of regional and national-scale fluxes of biogeochemically relevant elements (e.g. carbon) has been hampered by inconsistency of long-term sampling. In this study we solve the issue of sporadic, low-density and low-frequency sampling for nutrients by using Bayesian hierarchical generalised linear modelling. The Bayesian approach means that...

Slapton Ley, a coastal lake, is the largest natural body of fresh water in south‐west England. There was concern in the 1960s that the lake was becoming increasingly eutrophic. To quantify inputs of water, sediment and nutrients into the lake, Slapton Ley Field Centre initiated a programme of weekly water quality sampling in September 1970. Of all...

This study proposed that due to their high standing water tables that peatlands would be cold humid islands within their landscape, and especially so relative to farmland on mineral soils. To test this hypothesis, we measured air temperature and humidity at 17 locations along a 7.8 km transect across the UK's largest lowland raised bog from Februar...

Monitoring has played a key role in understanding the rates, extent and frequency of erosion on agricultural land and this includes projects in Switzerland, Germany and the UK. In this case we focus on highly erodible soils in the Rother valley, West Sussex, southern England on which grow a range of arable crops throughout the year. Erosion rates a...

This study has hypothesized that for many rivers the trade‐off between flow accumulation and the decrease in slope along channel length means that stream power increases downstream and, moreover, that given the low slope angles in headwater and low‐order streams, they would have insufficient stream power to erode let alone transport sediment. The s...

The Whin Sill is a doleritic intrusion into rocks of Carboniferous age in Northern England, stretching in an arc from the Alston Block (northern Pennines) northeast to the Northumberland coast including the Farne Islands. Its thickness is normally about 30 m but it can be much thicker locally, notably in Upper Teesdale. Injected into sedimentary st...

In this study we propose an approach to predicting the probability that river waters will exceed a water quality standard. The study used a two-part generalised linear modelling approach within a Bayesian framework. Binomial regression was used to model the probability that a water quality standard would be exceeded and included two factors – the d...

Understanding nutrient budgets makes it possible to predict where and by how much nutrients are accumulating in the environment. Previous studies have considered this problem for nitrogen (N) but have limited themselves to reactive N species (i.e. excluding N2) or have considered total N (including N2) but have been limited to regional or national...

Land use, land use change, and forestry (LULUCF) have been directly altering climate, and it has been proposed that such changes could mitigate anthropogenic climate warming brought about by increases in greenhouse gas emissions to the atmosphere. Changes due to LULUCF alter the Bowen ratio, surface roughness, and albedo and so directly change air...

Chapter 18 provides a detailed analysis of the long weather record at the Radcliffe Observatory, Oxford for December. Averages and extremes of temperature, precipitation and sunshine are presented, with coverage relevant to the month or season including the incidence of snowfall, thunderstorms, gales and the like, illustrated by contemporary accoun...

Chapter 19 provides a detailed analysis by calendar year of the long weather record at the Radcliffe Observatory, Oxford. Averages and extremes of temperature, precipitation and sunshine are presented, with notes on the warmest and coldest, wettest and driest, sunniest and dullest years. Details are included on notable heatwaves, wet and dry spells...

Chapter 17 provides a detailed analysis of the long weather record at the Radcliffe Observatory, Oxford for November. Averages and extremes of temperature, precipitation and sunshine are presented, with coverage relevant to the month or season including the incidence of snowfall, thunderstorms, gales and the like, illustrated by contemporary accoun...

This brief chapter is based upon daily weather statistics for the Radcliffe Observatory, Oxford, over the standard 30-year period 1981–2010. The warmest (i.e. most reliably warm) week of the year in Oxford is the final week of July; this also is one of the least rainy periods of the year, although the frequency of thunder is often at its greatest i...

Chapter 14 provides a detailed analysis of the long weather record at the Radcliffe Observatory, Oxford for August. Averages and extremes of temperature, precipitation and sunshine are presented, with coverage relevant to the month or season including the incidence of snowfall, thunderstorms, gales and the like, illustrated by contemporary accounts...

This chapter provides a brief introduction to the City of Oxford, its location, topography, climate and history. It provides a context for the weather observations presented in the rest of the book. Oxford, the county town of Oxfordshire, is located in the south Midlands of England. It lies just under 100 km west-north-west of London and 40 km nort...

Chapter 8 provides a detailed analysis of the long weather record at the Radcliffe Observatory, Oxford for February. Averages and extremes of temperature, precipitation and sunshine are presented, with coverage relevant to the month or season including the incidence of snowfall, thunderstorms, gales and the like, illustrated by contemporary account...

This chapter sets out the extremes of temperature, precipitation and snow depth, sunshine, considering both daily values as well as monthly means on the long record from the Radcliffe Observatory, Oxford, fully updated to 2018.

This chapter summarises other long-period weather observations from both the British Isles and Europe. The Radcliffe Observatory possesses the longest continuous series of weather records in Britain for one site: the first observations date from the mid-1760s, with unbroken daily temperature records since November 1813. It includes references to Go...

This chapter deals with extreme events and spells of weather in Oxford, some of them before the Radcliffe Observatory was built, but mostly based on the weather observations since 1767. Events such as heat waves, cold spells, severe gales, floods, droughts, snowfall and even the solar eclipse of 11 August 1999 are included. The chapter concludes wi...

This brief chapter catalogues the earliest and latest dates (extremes) on which various values of daily temperature, sunshine and snow depths have been recorded at the Radcliffe Observatory in Oxford.

This brief chapter analyses the extremes of precipitation excess and deficit recorded at the Radcliffe Observatory in Oxford since 1827. Tables of noteworthy spells of drought are included together with precipitation depth–duration extremes from 1 day to 1 year, updated to 2018.

Chapter 15 provides a detailed analysis of the long weather record at the Radcliffe Observatory, Oxford for September. Averages and extremes of temperature, precipitation and sunshine are presented, with coverage relevant to the month or season including the incidence of snowfall, thunderstorms, gales and the like, illustrated by contemporary accou...

Chapter 20 provides a detailed analysis of the long weather record at the Radcliffe Observatory, Oxford for winter. Averages and extremes of temperature, precipitation and sunshine are presented, with coverage relevant to the month or season including the incidence of snowfall, thunderstorms, gales and the like, illustrated by contemporary accounts...

This chapter sets out the basis of the annual cycle of weather at Oxford, which is then considered in more detail in the individual monthly and seasonal chapters which follow. Averages for the current standard period of 1981–2010 are used throughout the book to compare with previous data.

Chapter 7 provides a detailed analysis of the long weather record at the Radcliffe Observatory, Oxford for January. Averages and extremes of temperature, precipitation and sunshine are presented, with coverage relevant to the month or season including the incidence of snowfall, thunderstorms, gales and the like, illustrated by contemporary accounts...

This chapter sets out the extremes of temperature and sunshine, here considering longer multi-day ‘spells’ such as the longest heatwaves and cold spells, on the long record from the Radcliffe Observatory, Oxford, fully updated to 2018.

Chapter 10 provides a detailed analysis of the long weather record at the Radcliffe Observatory, Oxford for April. Averages and extremes of temperature, precipitation and sunshine are presented, with coverage relevant to the month or season including the incidence of snowfall, thunderstorms, gales and the like, illustrated by contemporary accounts...

Chapter 21 provides a detailed analysis of the long weather record at the Radcliffe Observatory, Oxford for spring. Averages and extremes of temperature, precipitation and sunshine are presented, with coverage relevant to the month or season including the incidence of snowfall, thunderstorms, gales and the like, illustrated by contemporary accounts...

Chapter 22 provides a detailed analysis of the long weather record at the Radcliffe Observatory, Oxford for summer. Averages and extremes of temperature, precipitation and sunshine are presented, with coverage relevant to the month or season including the incidence of snowfall, thunderstorms, gales and the like, illustrated by contemporary accounts...

This chapter deals with the growth of Oxford since 1767 and assessment of the potential influence of the expanding urban area on the temperature record from the Radcliffe Observatory, using long-period data from a semi-rural site at Rothamsted (Hertfordshire) and a more recent 3-year comparison with records from nearby Wallingford to assess the ext...

Chapter 23 provides a detailed analysis of the long weather record at the Radcliffe Observatory, Oxford for autumn. Averages and extremes of temperature, precipitation and sunshine are presented, with coverage relevant to the month or season including the incidence of snowfall, thunderstorms, gales and the like, illustrated by contemporary accounts...

Chapter 16 provides a detailed analysis of the long weather record at the Radcliffe Observatory, Oxford for October. Averages and extremes of temperature, precipitation and sunshine are presented, with coverage relevant to the month or season including the incidence of snowfall, thunderstorms, gales and the like, illustrated by contemporary account...

Oxford Weather and Climate since 1767 provides a detailed description and analysis of the weather records made at the Radcliffe Observatory in Oxford, the longest continuous series of single-site weather records in Britain and one of the longest in the world. The earliest records date from 1767, and daily records are unbroken since November 1813. T...

This chapter places Oxford’s climate in its regional context, including urban weather and ranging in scale from the Thames Valley and south-east England to the influence of the North Atlantic and the European continent. Oxford’s weather does not happen in isolation. Aside from perhaps the most local of rain showers or thunderstorms, the origins of...

An increasing body of observations gives a collective picture of a warming world and other related changes in the climate system. Each of the last three decades has been successively warmer than any preceding decade since 1850. Given the very long climate records for the Radcliffe Observatory, one should expect to observe other aspects of climate c...

Chapter 9 provides a detailed analysis of the long weather record at the Radcliffe Observatory, Oxford for March. Averages and extremes of temperature, precipitation and sunshine are presented, with coverage relevant to the month or season including the incidence of snowfall, thunderstorms, gales and the like, illustrated by contemporary accounts a...

This chapter gives some brief account of weather observations at Oxford prior to 1767, including John Locke’s observation of smoke from the Great Fire of London in 1666. However, the main purpose of the chapter is to describe the history of the Radcliffe Observatory and the work of Thomas Hornsby in its funding, design and construction. Hornsby, hi...

The flux of fluvial carbon from the terrestrial biosphere to the world's oceans is known to be an important component of the global carbon cycle but within this pathway the flux and return of carbon to the river network via sewage effluent has not been quantified. In this study monitoring data from 2000 to 2016 for the dissolved organic carbon (DOC...

The transformations and transitions of organic matter into, through, and out of an ecosystem must obey the second law of thermodynamics. This study considered the transition in the solid components of the organic matter flux through an entire ecosystem. Organic matter samples were taken from each organic matter reservoir and fluvial transfer pathwa...

Peatlands can accumulate organic matter into long-term carbon (C) storage within the soil profile. This study used solid state 13C nuclear magnetic resonance (13C-NMR) to investigate the transit of organic C through a peatland ecosystem to understand the molecular budget that accompanies the long term accumulation of C. Samples of biomass, litter,...

Given the importance of phosphorus (P) in the eutrophication of natural waters, this study considered the long-term time series of total phosphorus (TP) and total reactive phosphorus (TRP) in British rivers from 1974 to 2012. The approach included not only trend analysis of fluxes and concentrations but also change point analysis. TP and TRP concen...

Increased concentrations of dissolved organic carbon (DOC) have been reported for many catchments across the northern hemisphere. Hypotheses to explain the increase have varied (eg. increasing air temperature or recovery from acidification) but one test of alternative hypotheses is the trend over the recent decade, with the competing hypotheses pre...

Particulate organic matter (POM) transiting through rivers could be lost to overbank storage, stored in-channel, added to by erosion or autochthonous production, or turned over to release greenhouse gases to the atmosphere (either while in the water column or while stored in the channel). In the UK a net loss of POM across catchments has been recor...

Where Land Becomes Stream: Connecting Spatial and Temporal Scales to Better Understand and Manage Catchment Ecosystems; Rennes, France, 7–8 March 2017

A pattern of increasing frequency and intensity of heavy rainfall over land has been documented for several temperate regions and is associated with climate change. This study examines the changing patterns of daily precipitation at the Coweeta Hydrologic Laboratory, North Carolina, USA, since 1937 for four rain gauges across a range of elevations....

This study used thermogravimetric analysis (TGA) to study the transit of organic C through a peatland ecosystem. The biomass, litter, peat soil profile, particulate organic matter (POM), and dissolved organic matter (DOM) fluxes were sampled from the Moor House National Nature Reserve, a peat-covered catchment in northern England where both the dry...

Anthropogenic landscape alterations have increased global carbon transported by rivers to oceans since pre-industrial times. Few suitable observational datasets exist to distinguish different drivers of carbon increase, given that alterations only reveal their impact on fluvial dissolved organic carbon (DOC) over long time periods. We use the world...

A national river water quality database of total reactive phosphorus (TRP) and total phosphorus (TP) and flow was used, together with catchment characteristic datasets (soils, land use and hydroclimatic properties), to derive national fluvial phosphorus (P) flux estimates for Great Britain (England, Wales and Scotland) from 1974 to 2012. These fluv...