Zhuoshan Liu

Critter Cribs

Landscape Architecture - MLA

Edinburgh School of Architecture and Landscape Architecture (ESALA)

liuzhuoshan1999@gmail.com

workbook.pdf (1.64 MB)

Since the beginning of the Anthropocene, many plants and animals have gone extinct due to habitat loss, resulting in a significant decrease in biodiversity worldwide. These marvelous genes and species that had persisted for nearly 2 billion years had supported a rich ecosystem, which was a prerequisite for the diversity of human society, culture, and economy. Nowadays, ruins of this kind can be found all over the world, including deforested areas, depleted oil fields, barren farmlands and pastures. There is

Linear ecological devices

Project description

Since the onset of the Anthropocene, many plants and animals have gone extinct due to habitat loss, resulting in a significant decline in global biodiversity. These remarkable genes and species have persisted for nearly two billion years, once supporting rich ecosystems and serving as a prerequisite for human societal, cultural, and economic diversity. Invertebrates play a crucial role in the foundational level of the food chain, and their extinctions and rapid decline severely disrupt the flow of energy and nutrients, disturbing the balance of food chain interactions and significantly impacting ecosystems.

I approach the protection of invertebrates from a more micro-scale perspective. This involves designing intricate habitat networks for them based on spatial patterns and studying specific species' behaviors to guide design directions. Additionally, I reasonably predict the future effects of interactions between species and their environments, considering the landscape's dynamics and facilitating its development, with the aim of mitigating the biodiversity crisis. The goal is to create sites capable of nurturing complex networks of life and restoring their vitality.

The process of making an eco-installation

Dead wood material as a landscape installation can becomes the key to solving ecological problems

The stability and complexity of habitats depend on the combined interaction of the environment and biological behavior, including biological traits, interactions between organisms and their surrounding environment, as well as stochastic factors. The environment determines the species composition and ecological niches within a region, while the behaviors of multiple organisms within their respective niches continuously shape the environment.

Therefore, in material selection, I start with considering the ecological characteristics of the materials, assessing whether they can serve as habitats and provide assistance to species and ecosystems in the processes of the green and brown food webs.

The changing dynamics of ecological installations

A dynamic habitat stage

Deadwood habitats provide a stage for interactions among various biological communities. Firstly, deadwood provides a habitat for mosses and fungi. The presence of mosses creates a stable microclimate of localized moisture on the surface of deadwood, providing a more suitable habitat for invertebrates. It attracts birds, which bring diverse feces and seeds, aiding the growth of wildflowers and vegetation around the installation. Secondly, the wool within the installation can also store rainwater during rainy days, helping to maintain moisture in the deadwood. This benefits the growth of fungi, providing an opportunity for fungal growth on-site. This is exciting because once the fungal roots are established in the soil, they can extend for miles, forming a mycelial network that transfers chemical information, moisture, and necessary nutrients to the vegetation within the site, contributing to the food cycle for the plants within the site.

These biological and non-biological factors, through their combined action, accelerate the decay rate of wood. They expedite the breakdown of organic matter, aiding in the transfer of nutrients from the wood into the soil, which can then be absorbed by other organisms.

A dynamic habitat stage in grazing area

A dynamic habitat stage in woodland area

Ecological Operational Relationships Between Sites

These three sites are not managed in isolation, but rather as independent habitats that cooperate with each other in a system. Secondly, people use the region's own operating system to make use of the characteristics of each site, and through light human intervention, material and ecological transfer is achieved between sites, ensuring good site operation.