Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services in Multifunctional Landscapes

Crop Production

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Impacts of invertebrate biodiversity on crop production

through pollination and pest regulation

 

This work package is led by Juliet Osborne at the University of

Exeter and explores the spatial scales at which invertebrate

functional diversity affects crop pollination and pest regulation,

and the subsequent impacts on crop yields. 

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The following hypotheses will be tested:

 

H1. Grassland plant diversity is a key driver of the diversity and abundance of invertebrate pollinators and natural enemies of field bean and oilseed rape crops in the Wessex Chalk.

H2.The abundance and diversity of these invertebrates spilling over from grassland into crops is related to the proportion and quality of grassland in the landscape, and its distance from the crop. The varying mobilities of key invertebrates cause different within-crop spatial patterns.

H3. Effects of invertebrate functional diversity on pollination and pest regulation in crops can be predicted at the field and landscape scales using community-level aggregation of traits.

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The research will involve a large-scale survey of invertebrate biodiversity across a range of agricultural land use intensities. Data will be collated into functional groups to predict spatial patterns in pollination and pest regulation across the landscape. The work package will also a landscape-scale study involving detailed assessment of pollinators and pests in fields of oil seed rape and field beans surrounded by varying amounts and quality of grassland. Finally, manipulation experiments will be carried out to understand the functional role of different flower-visiting insect groups.

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