Grazing impacts on ground beetle (Coleoptera: Carabidae) abundance and diversity on semi‐natural grassland

Abstract

Semi‐natural grasslands are commonly managed as a grazing resource for domestic livestock but, due to their unique biodiversity, they are also of conservation interest. Numerous drivers have impacted on the status of these grasslands in recent decades, most importantly changing grazing management strategies. These changes have the potential to affect the biodiversity associated with these habitats, including on some rich invertebrate assemblages. Responses, however, are often dissimilar between different invertebrate taxa. We investigated the responses of ground beetles to different grazing regimes within a replicated, controlled, long‐term grazing experiment on upland semi‐natural grassland in Scotland. Although there was substantial overlap of species composition of ground beetle assemblages in different grazing treatments, species richness, abundance and Shannon diversity of ground beetles were significantly lower in ungrazed plots than in plots subject to high‐ or low‐intensity sheep grazing. Ground beetle abundance (but not species richness or diversity) was lower in ungrazed plots compared to those with low‐intensity mixed grazing by sheep and cattle. However, no differences were identified in abundance, species richness or diversity between the three grazed treatments. Our results suggest that ground beetles may show different responses to grazing compared to responses of some other invertebrate groups and demonstrate the difficulty of attempting to manage grazing to optimise conditions for a wide range of invertebrates.

Impact of Land Use on Peat Soil Elemental Content and Carabidae and Plant Species Composition and Abundance

“…In addition, different species characteristics were demonstrated for mowed and grazed plots [62], and it was found that a higher fertilization intensity was the most important factor for higher species richness and had a significant effect on species composition in both habitats. The studies in Scotland found that ground beetles were captured in lower overall numbers in ungrazed plots [65], while in the Netherlands, the abundance and activity of individual beetles was lower in grazed open grassland than in ungrazed open grassland [66].…”

“…Beetle species richness is going to reach its peak when mowed and grazed grasslands co-occur at low and high intensities [62] and is stimulated by a mosaic of grazing intensities. In addition, the abandonment of grazing [65] as well as mowing [69] can be detrimental to some biodiversity components. In order to understand the complex effects of management on beetles, it is important to properly quantify management intensity and distinguish between management types, as they have different effects on ground beetles [62].…”

Dataset: Biodiversity of Ground Beetles (Coleoptera, Carabidae) of the Republic of Mordovia (Russia)

“…The majority of species live in soil and ground substrates, and few representatives are found under the bark of trees and on herbaceous plants [19][20][21]. Depending on edaphic conditions, humidity, relief, microclimate, and vegetation cover, certain species compositions of ground beetles have been established [22][23][24][25]. Therefore, they can serve as excellent indicators of the ecological conditions of biocenoses and are widely used in monitoring studies [26][27][28][29], including in specially protected natural areas [30,31].…”

Ground Beetle (Coleoptera: Carabidae) Responses to Cattle Grazing, Grassland Restoration, and Habitat across a Precipitation Gradient

“…In addition, grazing may increase carabid diversity [ 88 ], thus we expected positive effects across the entire precipitation gradient. However, studies in Norway and Scotland showed that across varying grazing pressure, carabid abundance increased with grazing pressure, but diversity indices were similar across all sites [ 87 , 89 ]. Our results partially corroborate these findings.…”