Henckel Laura, Börger Luca, Meiss Helmut, Gaba Sabrina, Bretagnolle Vincent
Centre d'Etudes Biologiques de Chizé, UMR 7372, CNRS and Université de La Rochelle, Beauvoir-sur-Niort 79360, France
Centre d'Etudes Biologiques de Chizé, UMR 7372, CNRS and Université de La Rochelle, Beauvoir-sur-Niort 79360, France Department of Biosciences, Swansea University, Singleton Park, Swansea SA2 8PP, UK.
Proc Biol Sci. 2015 Jun 7;282(1808):20150002. doi: 10.1098/rspb.2015.0002.
Agro-ecosystems constitute essential habitat for many organisms. Agricultural intensification, however, has caused a strong decline of farmland biodiversity. Organic farming (OF) is often presented as a more biodiversity-friendly practice, but the generality of the beneficial effects of OF is debated as the effects appear often species- and context-dependent, and current research has highlighted the need to quantify the relative effects of local- and landscape-scale management on farmland biodiversity. Yet very few studies have investigated the landscape-level effects of OF; that is to say, how the biodiversity of a field is affected by the presence or density of organically farmed fields in the surrounding landscape. We addressed this issue using the metacommunity framework, with weed species richness in winter wheat within an intensively farmed landscape in France as model system. Controlling for the effects of local and landscape structure, we showed that OF leads to higher local weed diversity and that the presence of OF in the landscape is associated with higher local weed biodiversity also for conventionally farmed fields, and may reach a similar biodiversity level to organic fields in field margins. Based on these results, we derive indications for improving the sustainable management of farming systems.
农业生态系统是许多生物的重要栖息地。然而，农业集约化导致农田生物多样性急剧下降。有机农业（OF）通常被认为是一种对生物多样性更友好的做法，但由于其效益往往取决于物种和环境，因此有机农业有益效果的普遍性存在争议。目前的研究强调需要量化地方和景观尺度管理对农田生物多样性的相对影响。然而，很少有研究调查有机农业在景观层面的影响；也就是说，一块田地的生物多样性是如何受到周围景观中有机农田的存在或密度影响的。我们使用集合群落框架解决了这个问题，以法国集约化耕作景观中冬小麦的杂草物种丰富度作为模型系统。在控制了地方和景观结构的影响后，我们发现有机农业导致更高的地方杂草多样性，并且景观中有机农业的存在也与传统耕作田地更高的地方杂草生物多样性相关，并且在田边可能达到与有机田地相似的生物多样性水平。基于这些结果，我们得出了改善农业系统可持续管理的建议。
