“I research rivers,” Mason tells The Local. “I’m a fluvial geomorphologist, which means that I work on understanding how rivers shape themselves, how they change through time, and how we can manage rivers to restore them for biodiversity and improve the services that they provide for nature.”
Swedish rivers have an interesting history when it comes to human management, which made it a particularly good place for Mason’s research.
“I came over because it was a very interesting opportunity to try to understand how rivers in Sweden, or at least in northern Sweden, would have looked before humans came along and started modifying them,” he says.
“We kind of look back in time and see what these rivers would have looked like naturally. The reason that it's so interesting to work in rivers in Sweden is that they have such a fascinating history of human management with the log driving industry, where rivers were used to move timber from the forests, sometimes up to 250 kilometres downstream, to the timber mills at the coast.”
Log driving, known as flottning in Sweden, was the only way of moving timber logs from forests to mills for hundreds of years, with written references to the practice dating back as far as the mid-1700s.
“The rivers had to be modified to transport timber, so they were narrowed and straightened and deepened, sometimes by hand. Often boulders were blown up using dynamite and also using machinery, which has really changed the way that the river functions.”
This had knock-on effects for fish living in those rivers.
“If you’re a fish that’s trying to migrate upstream to spawn and fulfil your life cycle, then you don’t have any boulders that you can shelter behind in the flow, and you don’t have the habitats you need. So recreating some of these really important habitats is what my job involves.” Mason says.
It’s hard to measure exactly how changing rivers has impacted Swedish biodiversity, partly due to the fact that there are limited records on how diverse they were before humans started getting involved.
“We know that a lot of fish species, especially salmon, which are very important to Swedish culture and to Swedish ecosystems, have declined a lot since humans started modifying Swedish rivers. They face a lot of challenges, not just log driving but also hydropower, climate change and deterioration of marine ecosystems as well.”
In northern Sweden, there are still a number of untouched rivers, which makes it easier to see exactly how changes have affected habitats.
“In many countries there have been hundreds and hundreds of years of different modifications, which means it’s difficult to know how rivers would have looked in the past,” he says. "However in northern Sweden we were able to find sections of unmodified rivers, and we can really tell from those how a lot of the rivers that have been modified should have looked.”
Another advantage is the fact that Sweden in general, and northern Sweden in particular, is less densely populated than other parts of Europe.
“We can do some really interesting restoration in Sweden without posing any risk to infrastructure or people’s livelihoods,” Mason adds.
Part of that river restoration includes putting boulders back into rivers where they were taken out, and reconnecting side channels to larger rivers, which are particularly useful for juvenile fish.
“I guess you could say it’s about putting the mess back into the rivers, because that mess has really important roles to play in how rivers work, how they shape themselves and provide different habitats.”
Mason’s work is partly funded by the Swedish Research Council for Sustainable Development, and the country in general is particularly good when it comes to river restoration.
“The county administration boards have also secured some funding from the EU to restore many, many kilometres of timber floated Swedish streams. So my research is trying to understand how we can do that better, on a bigger scale, and really have the best possible impact for biodiversity.”
Locals are in general positive to river restoration work, despite the fact that there can be some negative effects.
“It’s really important to work with local people to guide this style of restoration,” Mason says. “Particularly a lot of novel types of restoration I’m working with, they often make the river wider and it can flood more frequently, although in a localised area, which can lead to reduced flooding downstream.”
“We’ve found generally that people are very on board with this type of restoration, because you can see visually that it’s improving habitat for fish. Suddenly spawning gravels appear where they weren’t before, and there are deep pools for fish.”
As an international researcher, Mason has some advice for others wanting to pursue a similar career in Sweden.
“It's fantastic working in this area for me, it's been a great opportunity to travel and see new places, and I've ended up staying here, so that's been really cool. My advice is to really try to think ahead and understand how the Swedish system works, because it's definitely something that I've learned through my five years in Sweden.”
“For example, if you come over as a postdoc, which is very common, you can only do one postdoc, and then you have to look at other types of employment in Sweden. So really trying to think ahead, thinking ‘what will the next step be for me’?”
Academia in Sweden is also slightly different from how things worked when Mason was studying in the UK.
“It’s difficult to compare because I was doing a PhD in the UK and wasn’t actively seeking jobs and funding in the same way,” he says. “But I would say my impression is that it can be easier to get research funding, but harder to get a lectureship or a permanent position. Although research funding is still very competitive here, so it’s still a challenging area to work in.”
Although Mason is from the UK, he came to Sweden before Brexit, which means he could move over under EU rules.
“It was relatively smooth, but still challenging. It’s one of those cases where if you happen to tick the boxes, then it goes relatively smoothly. I’ve been really lucky that I came just slightly before Brexit which made everything a lot easier.”
Coming from abroad, he was also surprised to find out about how important a role unions play in the Swedish labour market.
“I knew that there was unemployment insurance, but I wasn't aware that you need to have been a member of a-kassa for one year in order to top up your unemployment insurance. And then the unions can help to top that up a further amount, if you're part of a union, as well as advising you on other work challenges.”
“I've spoken to a lot of international colleagues, and in many places, unions are not as strong or as important as they are in Sweden, so that's been a learning curve for me.”
Mason also likes living in Umeå in particular, partly due to the fact that it’s less densely populated and close to nature.
“There’s just so much space. Within a five minute walk from my house, I can be in really nice nature areas. And if I want to go out for a day, if I’m selective, I can choose places where I won’t see any people for the entire day. Certainly in the UK, that just doesn’t happen. If you’re going somewhere nice with nature, everyone else is going there as well.”
For many people, the cold winters and few sunlight hours can also be a turn-off, but not for Mason.
“I really like the seasons. I like how wintry the winter is and how summery the summer is, and the changes in between. I think I’m probably one of the only people around here in Umeå at the moment who’s sad to see the snow go.”
As the largest city in Norrland, Umeå also has a thriving international community.
“It has a large university, so there are a lot of immigrants here, a lot of us speak mostly English. I'm learning Swedish but it definitely makes it easier that a lot of our research and teaching can be done in English."
"It’s a really good community, because there are so many international ‒ and Swedish ‒ people who build that community. Outside of the university the community may be a little less international, but it’s still there.”
He would definitely recommend Sweden as a place to pursue an academic career.
“In academia, it always depends on the project and your specific research, so you go to the place where there are teams doing similar things, or where there’s a need for that research. For me, that was Sweden.”
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