Differing effects of fallow type and landscape structure on the occurrence of plants, pollinators and birds on environmental fallows in Finland

Toivonen, Marjaana; Herzon, Irina; Kuussaari, Mikko

doi:10.1016/j.biocon.2014.10.034

Cited by 36 publications

(39 citation statements)

References 40 publications

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“…High cover of forest in the surrounding landscape may also enhance the availability of resources in traditional grassland habitats ( € Ockinger et al, 2012b). Surrounding forests have been shown to enhance plant species richness in adjacent semi-natural grasslands ( € Ockinger et al, 2012b) and perennial fallows (Toivonen et al, 2015), probably resulting from the immigration of forest-inhabiting species ( € Ockinger et al, 2012b). Besides the amount of nectar available, nectar quality is also important for butterflies (Lebeau et al, 2016).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The management and restoration of remaining semi-natural grasslands is vital, but so is a more holistic landscape approach that also takes into account other potentially valuable herbaceous habitats, such as field margins, forest edges, clear-cuts, power-line corridors, and fallows (Jonason et al, 2010;Berg et al, 2011;Blixt et al, 2015;Korpela et al, 2015;Toivonen et al, 2015;Viljur & Teder, 2016). The management and restoration of remaining semi-natural grasslands is vital, but so is a more holistic landscape approach that also takes into account other potentially valuable herbaceous habitats, such as field margins, forest edges, clear-cuts, power-line corridors, and fallows (Jonason et al, 2010;Berg et al, 2011;Blixt et al, 2015;Korpela et al, 2015;Toivonen et al, 2015;Viljur & Teder, 2016).…”

Section: Conclusion and Future Perspectivesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The management and restoration of remaining semi-natural grasslands is vital, but so is a more holistic landscape approach that also takes into account other potentially valuable herbaceous habitats, such as field margins, forest edges, clear-cuts, power-line corridors, and fallows (Jonason et al, 2010;Berg et al, 2011;Blixt et al, 2015;Korpela et al, 2015;Toivonen et al, 2015;Viljur & Teder, 2016). Conservation measures could include, for example, establishing new grassland patches, such as long-term perennial fallows (Alanen et al, 2011;Toivonen et al, 2015), close to forests, and logging at sunny forest edges to increase openness and structural heterogeneity in fieldforest ecotones (Merckx & Berwaerts, 2010;Merckx et al, 2012;Korpela et al, 2015). Our results support the view that forested landscapes provide excellent possibilities to enhance the conservation of grassland butterflies (Blixt et al, 2015;Korpela et al, 2015;Toivonen et al, 2015;Villemey et al, 2015;Viljur & Teder, 2016), including species with declining population trends.…”

Section: Conclusion and Future Perspectivesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In Northern and Eastern Europe, forests are often a dominating landscape element that plays a key role in supporting butterfly diversity (Berg et al, 2011;€ Ockinger et al, 2012a,b;Toivonen et al, 2015). High cover of forest in the surrounding landscape has been shown to enhance butterfly species richness in grasslands and fallows ( € Ockinger et al, 2012b;Liivam€ agi et al, 2014;Toivonen et al, 2015), and to mitigate the negative effects of habitat fragmentation on grassland butterflies ( € Ockinger et al, 2012a).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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High cover of forest increases the abundance of most grassland butterflies in boreal farmland

Toivonen

Peltonen

Herzon

et al. 2017

Insect Conserv Diversity

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High cover of forest in the landscape matrix has been shown to weaken the negative effects of habitat fragmentation on grassland butterflies. No studies have however focused on examining species‐specific responses of grassland butterflies to forest. The data from 3 years of butterfly monitoring in Southern Finland were used to test whether the amount of forest cover in the surrounding landscape affected the abundance of grassland butterfly species in semi‐natural grasslands, field margins, and forest edges. More than half of the studied species benefitted from high cover of forest. Species with the strongest preference for forested landscapes were Lycaena virgaureae, Argynnis adippe, Argynnis aglaja, and Boloria selene, which probably find suitable resources in herbaceous habitats at forest edges and clearings. Several small‐sized species were positively affected by surrounding forest cover in field margins but not in the other habitat types. Although field margins are suboptimal habitats for grassland butterflies, they provide important corridors for dispersal. High cover of forest in the landscape matrix may enhance butterfly dispersal along field margins by reducing windiness, which is likely to be most important for small‐sized species with poor dispersal capacity. The most abundant grassland species showed little or no preference for forested landscapes. Our results suggest that high cover of forest enhances the persistence of most grassland butterflies, including declining species, in boreal agricultural landscapes. The responses to forest are however strongly dependent on species‐specific properties and habitat types.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Conclusion and Future Perspectivesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The management and restoration of remaining semi-natural grasslands is vital, but so is a more holistic landscape approach that also takes into account other potentially valuable herbaceous habitats, such as field margins, forest edges, clear-cuts, power-line corridors, and fallows (Jonason et al, 2010;Berg et al, 2011;Blixt et al, 2015;Korpela et al, 2015;Toivonen et al, 2015;Viljur & Teder, 2016). Conservation measures could include, for example, establishing new grassland patches, such as long-term perennial fallows (Alanen et al, 2011;Toivonen et al, 2015), close to forests, and logging at sunny forest edges to increase openness and structural heterogeneity in fieldforest ecotones (Merckx & Berwaerts, 2010;Merckx et al, 2012;Korpela et al, 2015). Our results support the view that forested landscapes provide excellent possibilities to enhance the conservation of grassland butterflies (Blixt et al, 2015;Korpela et al, 2015;Toivonen et al, 2015;Villemey et al, 2015;Viljur & Teder, 2016), including species with declining population trends.…”

Section: Conclusion and Future Perspectivesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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High cover of forest increases the abundance of most grassland butterflies in boreal farmland

Toivonen

Peltonen

Herzon

et al. 2017

Insect Conserv Diversity

Self Cite

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“…In addition to the management recommendations advocated by Sanz-Pérez et al (2019), we recommend leaving a fraction of fallow land unmanaged as part of eco-schemes, even for more than one season, to safeguard biodiversity components other than birds (e.g. Kuussaari et al, 2011;Toivonen, Herzon, & Kuussaari, 2015;Tscharntke et al, 2011).…”

Section: A Ne W Opp Ortunit Y To Chang E the Fallow Par Ad I G Mmentioning

confidence: 99%

Changing the fallow paradigm: A win–win strategy for the post‐2020 Common Agricultural Policy to halt farmland bird declines

Tarjuelo

Margalida

Mougeot

2020

Journal of Applied Ecology

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Farmland bird populations have declined sharply due to agricultural intensification. In Europe, these negative population trends have been linked to the loss of semi‐natural vegetation types, particularly fallow land. The work of Sanz‐Pérez et al. (2019) has far‐reaching implications for the conservation of farmland biodiversity. We argue that it supports a new paradigm for the understanding and management of fallows that should be integrated into the forthcoming post‐2020 Common Agricultural Policy (CAP). Following the abolition of mandatory set‐aside by the European Union in 2008, fallows declined steadily in Europe until 2015, when the CAP implemented greening measures. These restored the requirement to leave 5% of arable land as ecological focus areas (EFAs) to enhance biodiversity. While fallows are one of the most beneficial forms of EFA for farmland birds, farmers prefer the less conservation effective planting of nitrogen‐fixing and catch crops (currently more than 70% of EFAs). CAP incentives have been insufficient to make unproductive EFAs such as fallows more attractive to farmers. Sanz‐Pérez et al. (2019) evaluated the impact of different fallow land management practices on the abundance of specialist farmland birds. They concluded that extensive practices – such as tilling or shredding once or twice per year before the breeding season – were more beneficial to these declining species than leaving fallows unmanaged and recommended their incorporation into agri‐environment schemes. But such schemes have had low uptake, and thus a limited potential to drive the widespread recovery of farmland birds at either national or European levels. The post‐2020 CAP, currently under development, should integrate simple fallow management practices within new conditionalities or eco‐schemes to address this problem. Synthesis and applications. The loss of fallow land underlies the decline of farmland birds. The post‐2020 CAP must overcome past mismatches between incentives to farmers and biodiversity benefits and increase farmers’ uptake of the most beneficial options for biodiversity, including fallows. Promoting light management of fallow land within the new CAP eco‐schemes is a win–win strategy because it would simultaneously allow farmers to continue extensive weed control and enhance habitat quality for farmland birds.

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Smart integration of food and bioenergy production delivers on multiple ecosystem services

Koppelmäki

Lamminen

Helenius

et al. 2021

Food and Energy Security

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Agriculture is expected to feed an increasing global population while at the same time meeting demands for renewable energy and the supply of ecosystem services such as provision of nutrient cycling and carbon sequestration. However, the current structure of the agricultural system works against meeting these expectations. The spatial separation of crop and livestock farms has created negative environmental consequences, and bioenergy production has created a trade‐off between food and energy production. In this paper, we explore the opportunities for ecological intensification at a regional scale made possible by combining food and energy production. We built three scenarios representing farming systems including biogas production using grass biomass and manure. These scenarios included the following: (a) The current system with energy production (CSE) from non‐edible agricultural biomasses (CSE). (b) Agroecological symbiosis (AES) identical to CSE except with 20% of the arable cropping area converted to clover‐grasses for use in biogas production. (c) Agroecological symbiosis with livestock (AES‐LST) where the available grass biomass (20% as in the AES) is fed to livestock and manure then used as a feedstock in biogas production. In each scenario, nutrients were circulated back to crops in the form of digestate. The supply of soil functions (primary production for food and energy, provision of nutrient cycling, and climate mitigation) and impacts on water quality through nutrient losses in these three scenarios were then compared to the current system. Integrating biogas production into food production resulted in an increased supply of nutrient recycling, reduced nutrient losses, and increased carbon inputs to the soils indicating enhanced climate mitigation. Food production was either not affected (CSE), increased (AES‐LST), or decreased (AES), and biogas was produced in substantial quantities in each scenario. Our study demonstrated potential synergies in integrating food and energy production without compromising other ecosystem services in each scenario.

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Differing effects of fallow type and landscape structure on the occurrence of plants, pollinators and birds on environmental fallows in Finland

Cited by 36 publications

References 40 publications

High cover of forest increases the abundance of most grassland butterflies in boreal farmland

High cover of forest increases the abundance of most grassland butterflies in boreal farmland

Changing the fallow paradigm: A win–win strategy for the post‐2020 Common Agricultural Policy to halt farmland bird declines

Smart integration of food and bioenergy production delivers on multiple ecosystem services

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