Filtyp
To promote a more sustainable agricultural production, the European Commission implemented direct payments that require farmers to implement greening measures aimed at reducing negative effects of agriculture on the environment and biodiversity. These greening measures (including fallows and permanent grasslands) have been criticised for their potential inability to conserve biodiversity and promo
Many studies have investigated effects of organic farming on the abundance and diversity of farmland birds, but few have considered how these effects vary between seasons. We analysed the effects of organic farming during an entire year in a previously understudied region, Galicia (North-West Spain), a relatively heterogeneous landscape which is an important wintering and breeding ground for birds
Warming may increase the extent and intensity of insect defoliations within Arctic ecosystems. A thorough understanding of the implications of this for litter decomposition is essential to make predictions of soil-atmosphere carbon (C) feedbacks. Soil nitrogen (N) and C cycles naturally are interlinked, but we lack a detailed understanding of how insect herbivores impact these cycles. In a laborat
Protein L, a cell wall molecule of certain strains of the anaerobic bacterial species Peptostreptococcus magnus, shows high affinity for human immunoglobulin (Ig) light chains. In the present study protein L was tested against a panel of human myeloma proteins of the IgG, IgM, IgA and IgE classes, and strong binding was seen with antibodies carrying kappa light chains. A high degree of specificity
Land-Use Change and Terrestrial Predator–Prey Networks Land-use change, here defined as the conversion of one land-use type into another (e.g., forest to arable land), affects biodiversity and biotic interactions worldwide (Sala et al., 2000). Although there has been large regional variation in the extent of agricultural expansion and abandonment in Europe in the past 50 years (Rabbinge and van Di
The contribution of terrestrially-derived carbon to micro-crustacean zooplankton biomass (i.e. allochthony) has been previously studied in lakes and reservoirs, but little is known about allochthony in rivers. We hypothesized that restricted selective grazing in turbulent environments such as rivers would decouple zooplankton from specific microbial and algal food resources, such that their alloch
Effective societal responses to rapid climate change in the Arctic rely on an accurate representation of region-specific ecosystem properties and processes. However, this is limited by the scarcity and patchy distribution of field measurements. Here, we use a comprehensive, geo-referenced database of primary field measurements in 1,840 published studies across the Arctic to identify statistically
Action-based payments that compensate farmers for adopting land-management measures to preserve and en- hance the environment have been criticized for being ineffective. The root of the problem is that farmers are not paid for achieving a desired environmental benefit, but compensated for their costs of management. There is growing interest in formulating result-based economic incentives. By payin
Uncertainty in pre-industrial natural aerosol emissions is a major component of the overall uncertainty in the radiative forcing of climate. Improved characterisation of natural emissions and their radiative effects can therefore increase the accuracy of global climate model projections. Here we show that revised assumptions about pre-industrial fire activity result in significantly increased aero
Local adaptation to rare habitats is difficult due to gene flow, but can occur if the habitat has higher productivity. Differences in offspring phenotypes have attracted little attention in this context. We model a scenario where the rarer habitat improves offspring's later competitive ability – a carryover effect that operates on top of local adaptation to one or the other habitat type. Assuming
The contribution of terrestrially derived carbon to micro-crustacean zooplankton biomass (i.e., allochthony) has been previously studied in lakes, reservoirs, and estuaries, but little is known about zooplankton allochthony in rivers. In lacustrine environments, allochthony is regulated by distinct selective feeding behavior of different taxa. However, we hypothesized that restricted possibility f
The spatiotemporal stability of wild organisms, such as flower-visiting insects, is critical to guarantee high levels of biodiversity in agroecosystems. Whereas the proportion of semi-natural habitats in the landscapes has been shown to stabilize the species richness of flower visitors, the effect of farming intensity has not yet been studied. In this study, we compared the temporal and spatial st
It is generally expected that, in environments with pronounced seasonal resource peaks, birds’ reproductive success will be maximised when nestlings’ peak food demand coincides with the timing of high food availability. However in certain birds that stay resident over winter, earlier breeding leads juveniles to join the winter flock earlier, which by the prior residence effect increases their succ
To understand the relationship between conservation measures and agricultural yields, we need to know the contributions of organisms to both ecosystem services and disservices. We studied the activity and contribution of birds and mammals to intermediate ecosystem services (predation of weed seeds or invertebrate pests) and disservices (predation of crop seeds or beneficial invertebrates) in south
In spatially heterogeneous environments, coexistence between competing species can be facilitated by spatially mediated tradeoffs. In this paper we develop a mechanistic model to investigate under which circumstances interspecific differences in the tradeoff between foraging efficiency and travel costs can allow two central place foraging species to coexist in spite of considerable overlap in reso
Loss and fragmentation of semi-natural grasslands have had negative consequences for grassland biodiversity, such as butterflies. Urban parks and other urban green spaces have so far largely been overlooked as suitable butterfly habitats, although they could potentially sustain diverse butterfly populations over time. We analysed the temporal change in butterfly species assemblages in urban green
Ecological intensification may reduce environmental externalities of agriculture by harnessing biodiversity to benefit regulating ecosystem services. However, to propose management options for the production of such services, there is a need to understand the spatiotemporal dynamics of net effects between ecosystem services and disservices provided by wild organisms across taxonomic groups in rela
Neonicotinoids are implicated in bee declines and laboratory studies imply that they impair the bee immune system, thereby precipitating a rise in pathogen levels. To establish whether such synergisms reduce bee performance in real-world agricultural landscapes, we analysed the microbial composition of the bumblebee (Bombus terrestris) samples from our recent landscape study on the impacts of fiel
