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  • Lost Habitats is a Data as a Service (DaaS) tool that uses AI to analyse historical maps, revealing changes in UK habitats, such as woodlands, wetlands, and pastures. It informs restoration efforts by showing how landscapes have evolved over the last 200 years.

  • Lost Habitats plays a pivotal role in habitat restoration by offering rich insights into historical ecosystems, helping users visualize how habitats like woodlands, wetlands, and pasturelands have evolved. By tracking historical connectivity, diversity, and habitat changes, Lost Habitats helps inform effective rewilding strategies and land management decisions. It identifies lost or degraded habitats that once thrived, guiding restoration efforts to rebuild these ecosystems based on accurate historical patterns. Furthermore, Lost Habitats helps pinpoint where to improve habitat connectivity, enhancing biodiversity corridors vital for species movement and resilience.
     

    The platform uses advanced AI to analyse historical and contemporary maps, producing data that reveals subtle landscape changes often overlooked by traditional methods. By leveraging historical data, conservationists and land managers can take targeted actions to restore habitats to their natural state, aligning with today’s ecological goals like Biodiversity Net Gain (BNG). The tool also supports better planning for habitat regeneration and long-term landscape resilience, ensuring that restoration projects are grounded in robust historical data and biodiversity assessments.
     

    You can find more detailed insights into how Lost Habitats aids restoration efforts on the ArchAI Lost Habitats page.

     

  • Lost Habitats provides detailed insights into primary habitats such as woodlands, wetlands, wood pasture, parkland, rough pasture, field boundaries, and ponds. The tool not only tracks these habitats over time but also sub-classifies them for deeper analysis. For example, woodland areas are classified as deciduous, coniferous, or mixed. You can discover whether a woodland was a plantation in the 19th century or has been maintained for 200 years, potentially identifying it as an ancient, sensitive ecosystem critical to biodiversity.

    These classifications help restoration efforts by targeting areas that are most in need of rewilding or protection, ensuring interventions align with the landscape’s historical and ecological context. For instance, knowing that a woodland has been ancient and undisturbed for centuries can inform decisions to preserve it as a vital component of biodiversity networks. Wetlands and pasturelands are similarly classified, revealing changes in type and condition over time, supporting efforts to restore degraded or lost ecosystems back to their natural states.

    Lost Habitats’ ability to identify historical habitats and how they have transformed over time provides critical information for creating targeted, data-driven restoration plans. Whether you are working on rewilding a historical wetland or preserving a centuries-old woodland, the model offers unparalleled insights into the past to guide today’s restoration efforts.

     

  • Conservationists, planners, land managers, developers, and environmental consultants can all benefit from Lost Habitats. The tool supports informed decision-making in land restoration, biodiversity net gain, environmental assessments, and strategic planning by providing valuable data on habitat changes over time. Whether you are managing large estates or smaller projects, Lost Habitats offers critical insights into landscape evolution.

    To learn more about how we are working with some of the UK’s largest landowners and organisations to support their nature recovery strategies, visit our Portfolio page.

  • Yes, Lost Habitats plays a key role in supporting Biodiversity Net Gain (BNG) requirements by providing historical and current data on biodiversity and landscape changes. By analysing past ecosystems, habitat loss, and connectivity, Lost Habitats helps land managers and developers plan projects that not only protect existing biodiversity but also restore and enhance it. The tool’s insights into habitat types and degradation can guide decisions to achieve the mandatory 10% net gain target set out by the UK government.

    To learn more about BNG and how it applies, visit the Biodiversity Net Gain guidance.

  • Lost Habitats is available through an annual Data as a Service (DaaS) licence for internal business use across all assets and land, with an ongoing annual maintenance fee after the initial purchase. Alternatively, data can be queried and purchased on a per-site basis via our API integration. It is delivered as a Web Feature Tile Service (WFTS) or file download for deeper analysis. The Lost Habitats Report is included as standard, providing immediate insights into habitat health, status, and change.
     

    Lost Habitats is also available through ArchAI's official licensed partners. For more information, please get in touch.

  • Lost Habitats sources its data from several key historical and contemporary resources. ArchAI has been working with the National Library of Scotland to develop a highly trained AI for the extraction and digitisation of their historical map records, including First and Second Edition Survey Maps and later epochs.

    The AI also digitises aerial and satellite imagery, as well as earth observation data, contributing to our industry-leading LIDAR models. Additionally, Lost Habitats utilises the latest Ordnance Survey maps, mapping habitat classifications to track changes over time, all the way to the present day. Learn more about OS maps here.

  • The data is updated annually, ensuring that users have the latest insights on habitat changes.

     

    At ArchAI, we continually improve the AI and add new historical records, such as additional editions of survey maps, new epochs, and refined habitat classifications. Each year, the updated Lost Habitats model will be available to licensees and partners through their licence and system integration, ensuring ongoing access to the latest data advancements.

  • Since 2019, we have been building a highly trained and bespoke AI specifically for Lost Habitats. This AI is what makes our analysis, data extraction, and digitisation so unique. By training the AI on British historical survey maps & Ordnance Survey data/maps, it is now able to accurately detect patterns in habitat changes, such as shifts in woodland connectivity or wetland loss. Its ability to process and interpret complex data allows for accurate, data-driven restoration strategies and a clear understanding of how ecosystems have evolved over the last 200 years, supporting better decision-making in conservation and land management.

  • Yes, Lost Habitats is unique in the UK, offering a comprehensive, AI-powered analysis of historical habitats, delivered as a Data as a Service (DaaS) to support conservation and land management efforts.

  • To become a partner or obtain a licence for Lost Habitats, please contact the ArchAI team directly.

     

    You can discuss partnership opportunities or licence agreements to access and utilise the Lost Habitats Data as a Service model for your organisation.

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