•Driving environmental factors for pollinator abundance on agricultural fields were identified and quantified.•The study combines both landscape and crop scale, and considers multiple groups of ...pollinators.•Temporal components (reflecting the activity period of the pollinators and the cultivation period of the crops) were also taken into account.
Pollination is a key ecosystem service. Pollinators, however, are in decline and their service is increasingly threatened. The decline is driven by several factors, most of which are related to agricultural management. However, the complexity of the landscape system, consisting of both cropped and non-cropped areas, makes it difficult to address or even quantify the role of farming practices in pollinator abundance. Therefore, the aim of this paper is to improve our understanding of the relationships between pollinator abundance and their habitat use. We intend to identify and quantify the driving environmental factors that determine pollinator abundance in agricultural landscapes on the crop and landscape scale. These information helps us to design algorithms that can be used as a basis for predicting pollinator abundance on agricultural fields. To integrate varying environmental conditions data sampling was performed on farms in three different regions in Germany. Pollinators were classified into different groups with three aggregation levels. We observed crop parameters as well as landscape parameters in the areas surrounding fields in addition to temporal aspects. Generalized linear models (GLMs) were then calculated. Our results showed that both crop and landscape parameters affect pollinator abundance on agricultural fields. However, the explanatory power of the included parameters varied strongly among the particular pollinator groups and between aggregation levels. Furthermore, differentiation between species groups improves the explanatory power compared to models that are more aggregated. We also found that the temporal match between main activity periods of the particular pollinator groups and resource supply by the crop species is a key factor when analysing pollinator abundance. In conclusion, we demonstrated that the assessment and support of pollination services should be carried out with regard to individual pollinator groups. When studying pollinator abundance, the crop as well as the landscape scale should be addressed. A range of different habitat requirements and different activity periods of the pollinator groups must be covered to maintain pollination services, and therefore both diverse landscapes and diverse crop rotations are of crucial importance.
•We developed scenarios of agricultural intensification at farm scale.•We applied indicators to assess regional sustainability impacts of farm-level scenarios.•Scenario impacts showed regional ...variations depending on yield potentials and landscape features.•We discussed trade-offs of scenario impacts with policy stakeholders.•The method is exemplary for regional sustainability assessment of agricultural land use changes.
Decisions for agricultural management are taken at farm scale. However, such decisions may well impact upon regional sustainability. Two of the likely agricultural management responses to future challenges are extended use of irrigation and increased production of energy crops. The drivers for these are high commodity prices and subsidy policies for renewable energy. However, the impacts of these responses upon regional sustainability are unknown. Thus, we conducted integrated impact assessments for agricultural intensification scenarios in the federal state of Brandenburg, Germany, for 2025. One Irrigation scenario and one Energy scenario were contrasted with the Business As Usual (BAU) scenario. We applied nine indicators to analyze the economic, social and environmental effects at the regional, in this case district scale, which is the smallest administrative unit in Brandenburg. Assessment results were discussed in a stakeholder workshop involving 16 experts from the state government.
The simulated area shares of silage maize for fodder and energy were 29%, 37% and 49% for the BAU, Irrigation, and Energy scenarios, respectively. The Energy scenario increased bio-electricity production to 41% of the demand of Brandenburg, and it resulted in CO2 savings of up to 3.5milliontons. However, it resulted in loss of biodiversity, loss of landscape scenery, increased soil erosion risk, and increased area demand for water protection requirements. The Irrigation scenario led to yield increases of 7% (rapeseed), 18% (wheat, sugar beet), and 40% (maize) compared to the BAU scenario. It also reduced the year-to-year yield variability. Water demand for irrigation was found to be in conflict with other water uses for two of the 14 districts. Spatial differentiation of scenario impacts showed that districts with medium to low yield potentials were more affected by negative impacts than districts with high yield potentials.
In this first comprehensive sustainability impact assessment of agricultural intensification scenarios at regional level, we showed that a considerable potential for agricultural intensification exists. The intensification is accompanied by adverse environmental and socio-economic impacts. The novelty lies in the multiscale integration of comprehensive, agricultural management simulations with regional level impact assessment, which was achieved with the adequate use of indicators. It provided relevant evidence for policy decision making. Stakeholders appreciated the integrative approach of the assessment, which substantiated ongoing discussions among the government bodies. The assessment approach and the Brandenburg case study may stay exemplary for other regions in the world where similar economic and policy driving forces are likely to lead to agricultural intensification.
Hyvönen T, Glemnitz M, Radics L & Hoffmann J (2011). Impact of climate and land use type on the distribution of Finnish casual arable weeds in Europe. Weed Research51, 201–208.
Summary
The aim of the ...study was to explore the impact of climate and land use type on species richness and abundance of arable weeds found as casual aliens in Finland. We used an empirical data set collected along a European climate gradient, from which 163 plants were selected for the analyses. Using generalised linear modelling (GLMM) and redundancy analysis (RDA), we compared species richness and abundance of all species and three functional groups (dicotyledons and grasses, C3 and C4 species, alien and native species to Europe), as well as occurrence of the 13 most common individual species between three land use types (fallow, low‐input and conventionally cultivated) and six regions. In general, fallowing and low‐input cultivation, as well as warmer climate, supported greater weed species richness and abundance. Temperature was found to be a more important factor for weed abundance than land use. The only exception was C4 species richness, which did not respond to either factor. The impact of land use was independent of climate for all variables, except C4 species abundance. Non‐cultivated fallows had more weeds than cultivated fields, in most cases. No difference was found in the species richness and abundance of grasses or in the occurrence of individual species between low‐input and conventionally cultivated fields. It was evident that climate and land use affect the distribution of arable weed species currently found as casual aliens in Finland. This suggests that climate warming will increase the risk of the population establishment of new weed species in northern regions.
•Hare movement behaviour was studied before and after agricultural management events.•Hares spend more time on recently harvested crop fields, but not on mown grasslands.•Management events affect ...hare range sizes only in areas with large crop fields.•Hares shift their ranges away or towards fields depending on the management type.•Energy expenditure of hares is unaffected by agricultural management.
Agricultural landscapes are spatially and temporally dynamic habitats that force wildlife to interact with different management practices, such as harvests and mowing events which cause sudden changes in resource availability. Animals may avoid agricultural management events and the changed habitat, to search for undisturbed areas or they might use and explore such areas due to beneficial changes in vegetation structure. Further, landscape structure might influence the movement processes that are underlying reactions to agricultural management. Here we study how agricultural management events affect animal movement behaviour in two contrastingly structured agricultural landscapes.
In 2014 and 2015 we collared 36 European brown hares (Lepus europaeus) with GPS-tags and accelerometers in Northeast Germany (large agricultural fields) and South Germany (small fields and comparatively more non-arable vegetation). We recorded hares’ movement behaviour for 4 days before and after agricultural management events without (e.g. fertilizer application) and with (harvest and mowing) immediate changes in resource availability, on the most common production cover types (wheat, grasslands, maize and rapeseed). We measured the number of GPS points in the focal fields, the range size (area covered within 4 days), the shift in range centre, and the hares’ energy expenditure (overall dynamic body acceleration).
More GPS locations were found on fields following management events that affected resource availability, and less GPS fixes were recorded on the wheat fields after management events without resource changes. Compared to an equivalent period without management events, hares showed increased range shifts after harvesting maize and rapeseed fields, mowing grasslands and after management events without resource changes for most of the production cover types. Range sizes were only affected in wheat fields in Northeast Germany, where they increased after harvest and decreased after management events without resource changes. Energy expenditure was unaffected by agricultural management.
Hares may profit from harvested fields, likely because they find food in form of fallen grains, improve their predator detection probability and generally prefer areas with low vegetation. The reaction to management events without the change of resources might depend on the specific type of management practices (e.g. organic vs. inorganic fertilizer). Landscape structure may play an important role as range sizes increase due to the necessity to reach distant alternative habitats. Hence, the provision of smaller fields with high crop diversity and sufficient alternative habitat patches throughout the year has the potential to maximise accessible resources and predator detection ability for hares and other farmland wildlife.
Kettle holes are small, pond-like, depressional wetlands in young moraine landscapes. They mostly undergo a wet-dry cycle and have a high potential for biological species diversity. However, their ...biodiversity and habitat function is often greatly impacted by surrounding intensive agricultural land use practices.
In this study, we used statistical analysis of a large data set from the federal state of Brandenburg (Northeast Germany) to characterise the macrophyte species richness of kettle holes in an interregional context and to determine the factors that influence macrophyte occurrence. We proposed that (1) specific environmental factors, (2) hydrogeomorphic kettle hole types and (3) the regional topography have a major impact on macrophyte species richness. The evaluation of the data was performed using the General Linear Model (GLM) and Canonical Correspondence Analysis (CCA). Each of the analysed factors addresses different parts of the macrophyte species richness, including the target variables overall species richness, plant life and growth forms as well as Red List species.
None of the analysis showed effects of the tested environmental factors on overall macrophytes species richness, but on the richness of plant life and growth forms as well as on Red List species. We identified hydroperiod, depth, shore width, kettle hole area, pH, electric conductivity, carbonate hardness and oxygen as key factors for the prediction of species richness of plant life and growth forms. Furthermore, we demonstrate that hydrogeomorphic kettle hole types account for relevant parts of variation in species richness and are useful interregional and integrative indicators to identify kettle holes with protection priority for macrophytes.
•A socio-ecological system was developed to analyse contrasting case studies based on stakeholder perceptions.•Perceptions on agricultural landscape services, biodiversity and changes were ...systematically gathered.•Climate change is the most often perceived driver for landscape service change, next to policies and markets.•Results indicate complementary knowledge of different stakeholder groups.•Future policies need landscape-specific targets and integrate knowledge of different stakeholders.
Many studies have explored farmers’ perspectives on biodiversity and ecosystem services, but fewer qualitative and cross-country comparisons exist. We develop a socio-ecological system to analyse agricultural landscape services, biodiversity, and drivers that have affected these services in recent decades. Via a systematic stakeholder mapping and 49 semi-structured interviews, we identify stakeholder perceptions of this system. We compare the perceptions across four regional case studies (Austria, Estonia, Germany, Switzerland), and two stakeholder groups (land managers and administrators). The case studies share certain commonalities in perceptions (e.g., provisioning and regulating services discussed in all of them) but also show differences (e.g., changes in biodiversity and landscape services more often perceived in the Swiss and German cases, but less in the Austrian and Estonian case studies). Across all case studies, typical land use change can be attributed to multiple drivers of various strengths, with climate change being the most often perceived driver directly affecting landscape services, followed by policies and market-based drivers, which affect services and biodiversity indirectly via land use. Compared to the administrators (e.g., decision-makers, scientists), the managers (e.g., farmers, NGOs) discuss more often the drivers, like various biodiversity and landscape service categories, as well as climate change, markets, and technologies. However, the administrators focus more on cultural services, policies as drivers, and consider more often links between drivers and landscape services and/or biodiversity. Hence, both of the groups’ (administrators and managers) perceptions partly complement each other. Since policy making should be based on the best knowledge of different stakeholder groups, active knowledge exchange between managers and administrators should be supported and outcome considered in decision making. The resulting regional differences in stakeholder perceptions of the drivers and their respective impact on agricultural landscapes suggest that future agricultural policies need regional targeting and the consideration of landscape-specific characteristics.
Indicators to assess sustainable land development often focus on either economic or ecologic aspects of landscape use. The concept of multifunctional land use helps merging those two focuses by ...emphasising on the rule that economic action is per se accompanied by ecological utility: commodity outputs (CO, e.g., yields) are paid for on the market, but non-commodity outputs (NCO, e.g., landscape aesthetics) so far are public goods with no markets.
Agricultural production schemes often provided both outputs by joint production, but with technical progress under prevailing economic pressure, joint production increasingly vanishes by decoupling of commodity from non-commodity production.
Simultaneously, by public and political awareness of these shortcomings, there appears a societal need or even demand for some non-commodity outputs of land use, which induces a market potential, and thus, shift towards the status of a commodity outputs.
An approach is presented to merge both types of output by defining an indicator of social utility (SUMLU): production schemes are considered with respect to social utility of both commodity and non-commodity outputs. Social utility in this sense includes environmental and economic services as long as society expresses a demand for them. For each combination of parameters at specific frame conditions (e.g., soil and climate properties of a landscape) a production possibility curve can reflect trade-offs between commodity and non-commodity outputs. On each production possibility curve a welfare optimum can be identified expressing the highest achievable value of social utility as a trade-off between CO and NCO production.
When applying more parameters, a cluster of welfare optimums is generated. Those clusters can be used for assessing production schemes with respect to sustainable land development.
Examples of production possibility functions are given on easy applicable parameters (nitrogen leaching versus gross margin) and on more complex ones (biotic integrity).
Social utility, thus allows to evaluate sustainability of land development in a cross-sectoral approach with respect to multifunctionality.
The relationship between geomorphological habitat heterogeneity and species diversity was investigated on set-aside areas in arable land. The species assemblage of the studied set-aside areas had to ...be aggregated to groups of similar ecological behavior and indices of species diversity. Different methods of quantifying geomorphological habitat heterogeneity were tested, the relationship being investigated through regression and redundancy analysis. Two different sets of geomorphological data were used, one derived from already existing data bases like a digital elevation model and soil maps, the other also containing results from an investigation of the habitats. Significant relationships were found at different levels of data aggregation allowing for species diversity to be assessed based on geomorphological habitat heterogeneity.
Die räumliche Abschätzung der Grünland vegetation eines Niedermoorgebietes wurde mit Hilfe eines GIS-gestützten Modells erprobt. Modellvoraussetzung war die Hypothese, dass sich Vegetationsformen des ...Niedermoorgrünlandes aus den Standort- und Bewirtschaftungsfaktoren ableiten lassen. Digitalisierte Karten der Wasserregulierbar-keit, der Geländehöhen, des Bodentyps und der Landnutzung bildeten die raumbezogene Datengrundlage. In einem ersten Schritt wurde durch Kombination von Wasserregu-lierbarkeits- und Geländehöhenkarte eine differenzierte Wasserstufenkarte erzeugt. Den dreifaktoriellen Merkmalskombinationen aus Wasserstufe, Bodentyp und Landnutzung ordneten wir 13 Vegetationsformen zu. Die Zuordnungsregeln sind anhand von ca. 300 Vegetationsaufnahmen unter Einbeziehung von Literaturangaben erarbeitet worden. Ein Vergleich der Modellvegetation mit Stichproben im Gelände ergab eine Übereinstimmung von 62,5%. Hauptsächliche Fehlerursache waren abweichende Wasserstufen, die einerseits der Modellvegetation und andererseits der korrespondierenden Geländevegetation zugrunde lagen.
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