Wetlands Ecology and Management 11: 51–63, 2003. © 2003 Kluwer Academic Publishers. Printed in the Netherlands. 51 Status and restoration of peatlands in northern Europe H. Vasander 1,∗ , E.-S. Tuittila 1 , E. Lode 2 , L. Lundin 3 , M. Ilomets 2 , T. Sallantaus 4 , R. Heikkilä 5 , M.-L. Pitkänen 6 & J. Laine 1 1 Department of Forest Ecology, P.O. Box 27, FIN-00014University of Helsinki, Finland; 2 Institute of Ecology, Tallinn Pedagogical University, Kevade 2, EE-10137 Tallinn, Estonia; 3 Department of Forest Soils, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, P.O. Box 7001, S-75007 Uppsala, Sweden; 4 Regional Environmental Agency of Pirkanmaa, P.O. Box 297, FIN-33101 Tampere, Finland; 5 Kainuu Regional Environment Centre, FIN- 88900 Kuhmo, Finland; 6 Forest and Park Service, P.O. Box 38, FIN-39701 Parkano, Finland; ∗ Author for correspondence: Tel: +358-9-191 58140, Fax: +358-9-19158100, E-mail: harri.vasander@helsinki.fi Received 11 March 2001; accepted in revised form 1 July 2002 Key words: cut-away peatlands, Estonia, Finland, forest drainage, mires, monitoring, Sweden Abstract Environmental management of peatlands, landscape ecology and protection of key biotopes have created needs and pressure to restore drained peatlands to natural mire ecosystems. Here, we summarize different approaches and restoration techniques developed for peatland management in Estonia, Sweden, and Finland where peatlands are abundant. Without rewetting, plant colonisation on abandoned cut-away areas is slow due to harsh hydrological and microclimatic conditions. However, after restoration, cut-away peatlands may return to a functional state close to that of pristine mires, and therefore restore a net carbon sink function within a few years. In addition, restoration techniques can help to create buffer zones between terrestrial and limnic ecosystems that reduces the nutrient loading imposed on watercourses by forestry operations. Restoration may also be important for peatland conservation programs as drained peatlands are part of present and future conservation areas. Finally, restoration actions in themselves can have negative environmental impacts. For instance, inundation of peat surfaces resulting from the rewetting process often increases phosphorus leaching. Efforts on peatland restoration should focus on environmental monitoring, research on restoration and its environmental impact as well as public relations activities. In that respect, knowledge transfer between academics and managers should generate synergy benefits. Question: Who was the first restorer of mires in north- ern Europe? Answer: The Estonian national hero Kalevipoeg. Ac- cording to an ancient saga (written by Kreutzwald, 1862, from oral collections), after arguments with local farmers about taxation he ordered a big plough from the blacksmith and turned their fields back into mires: habitats for cranes and frogs! Introduction Peatlands cover about 96 Mha (∼20%) of the land area of Europe (Lappalainen, 1996a). Joosten (1997) states that about 60% of pristine European peatlands have been altered. Human-induced changes include about 50% for agriculture, 30% for forestry and 10% for peat extraction. From the estimations of Lappalainen (1996a) and Lundin (1999), it can be concluded that about 25%, i.e. 240 000 km 2 , of European peatlands are located in the Baltic Sea basin, making up at least 14% of the basin area. Many of these (41%) are located in the northern sub-basin – the Bothnian Bay area, where there are more extreme climate variations (temperate – oroarc- tic in S-N direction, maritime – continental in W-E direction) and suitably low-relief surface topography. A large part of the remaining peatland area, about 50%, is divided equally between the Bothnian Sea,