Agriculture, Ecosystems & Environment

Conventional tillage (i.e. plowing) is often associated with soil degradation and a loss of biodiversity. In response, reduced tillage has increasingly been promoted as a sustainable alternative for its positive impacts on soil structure, water dynamics, and biodiversity. However, reduced tillage not only favors beneficial soil-dwelling organisms, but also pests. In this field study, we examined the effects of five years of reduced tillage on the physical properties of the soil and the dynamics of Agriotes wireworm populations (Elateridae), which are increasingly widespread pests. Our results show that tillage reduction led to stable edaphic conditions and a redistribution of organic matter, creating a favorable environment for wireworms. While our results demonstrate the beneficial effects of reduced tillage on aggregate stability, they also indicate a concomitant increase in soil bulk density, suggesting a reduction in water-holding capacity. Monitoring of wireworm populations revealed their aggregated distribution and their increase in abundance in infested areas year on year. Monitoring soil moisture revealed that tillage reduction improved water dynamics, enhancing infiltration and reducing evaporation. This could potentially favor the development of wireworms. Surprisingly, wireworm size distribution showed a higher proportion of young instars in plowed plots, evidencing that, firstly, the lack of soil cover does not prevent oviposition and that injury caused by plowing targets more the last instars rather than young larvae. While reduced tillage improves key soil health indicators, our findings suggest a potential trade-off in terms of increased pest pressure. Our study highlights the importance of adopting a holistic approach when designing sustainable cropping systems, as well as considering the services and dis-services they provide.

Urban greenspaces, encompassing parks, golf courses, roundabouts, and urban crops, have potential to offset urban carbon footprints by storing soil organic carbon (SOC). This study analyzed particulate organic carbon (POC) and mineral-associated organic carbon (MAOC) stocks in topsoil across 27 Iberian cities, comparing urban greenspaces with natural ecosystems under varying climatic and edaphic conditions. Results revealed that urban greenspaces store comparable SOC stocks to natural ecosystems, with MAOC stocks being more dominant and stable across land-use types. POC stocks showed variability, particularly lower in roundabouts and parks compared to natural ecosystems, but remained similar in golf courses and urban crops. SOC fractions correlated inversely with mean annual temperature (MAT), emphasizing the need for cooling strategies in urban areas to preserve stable carbon pools. While MAOC exhibited saturation at higher SOC levels, POC showed a linear increase. This study highlights the importance of tailored management practices to enhance carbon storage in urban soils for climate change mitigation.

Understanding the impact of biological and environmental stresses on crop performance is essential to secure the long-term sustainability of agricultural production. How cropping systems modify weed communities and wheat yield in response to predicted climate conditions is unknown. We tested the effect of warmer, and warmer and drier conditions on weed biomass, weed community characteristics, and winter wheat yields in three contrasting cropping systems: a no-till chemically managed system, a tilled organic system, and an organic system that used grazing to reduce tillage. Weed communities in the organic systems were more diverse and more variable than the no-till conventional system, though the grazed organic and no-till conventional systems had more similar relative species abundance. Cropping system affected weed biomass and weed species composition recorded in 0.75 m2 split-plots, with the most biomass recorded in grazed organic system (38 g {+/-}23.4 SE) compared to the tilled-organic (17 g {+/-}10.3 SE) and no-till chemically managed systems (<1 g {+/-}0.02). Climate conditions had relatively minor impacts on weed communities compared with cropping systems. Wheat yield was highest in the no-till conventional system but declined in response to warmer and drier conditions despite its low weed biomass. Yield was lower in the tilled organic and grazed organic cropping system but declines in warmer and drier conditions were more variable among years. In the Northern Great Plains, predicted climate scenarios have the potential to alter weed communities and reduce wheat yield, and designing resilient cropping systems is essential to mitigate these negative impacts.

Avian-mediated pest control is a significant ecosystem service with important economic implications. However, there is an overall paucity of experimental information about how landscape simplification affect its current level. Information on pest control by birds is missing in some permanent agroecosystems of worldwide importance, like olive orchards, that dominate vast areas in the Mediterranean region. We assess the effectiveness of insectivorous birds for controlling the two main pest insects in olive orchards and explore the effects of landscape complexity and distance to semi-natural patches on avian insectivore abundance and pest control. For this, we combine bird surveys with field experiments (branch exclusions and pest plasticine models) at the regional scale. Landscape heterogeneity increased the abundance and richness of insectivorous birds, which were also more abundant and diverse in semi-natural patches, compared to the farm olive matrix. Experiments evidenced that pest control by birds (measured as attack rates to plasticine models and pest damage) in the studied olive orchards is negligible, while pests were overall abundant and pest damage was high on most farms. This raises alarms about the status of avian pest control in this agroecosystem. Although landscape heterogeneity increased the abundance/richness of insectivorous birds, and favored some forest species, insectivorous bird abundance seems diluted in relation to prey availability in all landscapes. Thus, pest control by birds seems currently unsuccessful in olive orchards. Our results might be evidencing the loss of an ecosystem service due to a generalized massive decline of common and forest insectivorous birds. Key messageO_LIOlive orchards dominate extensive areas causing important landscape simplification. C_LIO_LIInsectivorous birds are more abundant in semi-natural patches within olive farms. C_LIO_LIField experiments show a low impact of birds on olive pests and damage. C_LIO_LIAvian-mediated pest biocontrol seems diluted by limited suitable habitat for birds. C_LIO_LIAgri-environmental measures should focus on increasing landscape complexity. C_LI

Agricultural management recommendations based on short-term studies can produce findings inconsistent with long-term reality. Here, we test the long-term relative profitability and environmental sustainability of continuous no-till agriculture practices on crop yield, soil moisture, and N2O fluxes. Using a moving window approach, we investigate the development and stability of several attributes of continuous no-till as compared to conventional till agriculture over a 29-year period at a site in the upper Midwest, U.S. We find that over a decade is needed to detect the consistent benefits of no-till on important attributes at this site. Both crop yield and soil moisture required periods 15 years or longer to generate patterns consistent with 29-year trends. Only marginally significant trends for N2O fluxes appeared in this period. Importantly, significant but misleading short-term trends appeared in more than 20% of the periods examined. Relative profitability analysis suggests that 10 years after initial implementation, 86% of periods recuperated the initial expense of no-till implementation, with the probability of higher relative profit increasing with longevity. Results underscore the essential importance of decade and longer studies for revealing the long-term dynamics and emergent outcomes of agricultural practices for different sustainability attributes and are consistent with recommendations to support the long-term adoption of no-till management.\n\nGRAPHICAL ABSTRACT\n\nO_FIG O_LINKSMALLFIG WIDTH=200 HEIGHT=187 SRC=\"FIGDIR/small/788240v1_ufig1.gif\" ALT=\"Figure 1\">\nView larger version (42K):\norg.highwire.dtl.DTLVardef@1e7529eorg.highwire.dtl.DTLVardef@1e11268org.highwire.dtl.DTLVardef@17f8995org.highwire.dtl.DTLVardef@2196fe_HPS_FORMAT_FIGEXP M_FIG C_FIG HIGHLIGHTSO_LIWe test long-term effects of no-till on yield, soil moisture, and N2O fluxes\nC_LIO_LIWe examine 29 years of data with a moving window and relative profitability method\nC_LIO_LIIt takes at least a decade to detect consistent benefits of no-till\nC_LIO_LIShorter studies can produce significant but misleading findings\nC_LIO_LILong studies are essential to reveal the dynamics of agricultural management\nC_LI

Agricultural soils lose P to waterbodies and C to the atmosphere. Reversing the C trend requires change in management (carbon farming), but what is the effect of carbon farming practices on P transport from soils to waterbodies? This was empirically studied by analyzing the P loss risks from 20 farms participating in a 5-year on-farm carbon farming experiment. We evaluated the effect of C farming practices on soil P balance, P stocks, and potential P loss through surface and subsurface runoff and erosion. Based on the results, carbon farming had only minor impacts on P loss compared with the current soil conservation practices already applied by the farms. The farmers did not utilize the opportunity to reduce P fertilization through some carbon farming practices which could improve soil P availability, therefore resulting in weak P balances. Furthermore, only a small fraction of the field area (18%) was responsible for the majority (50%) of the estimated P loss, indicating the importance of P loss hotspots. C farming practices do not seem to improve water quality unless they are tailored to target key processes of P loss such as maintaining a negative P balance on high-P sites, reducing runoff, and focusing on local critical source areas.

While many herbicide active substances have been banned and weed infestation is a major threat to crop productivity, it is still unknown to what extent natural weed control provided by seed predators can help farmers manage weed communities. We aim to quantify the contribution of seed predators to crop productivity through weed control and to evaluate whether the magnitude of their influence depends on farming systems such as conservation agriculture. We set up 112 seed predator-exclusion cages in 28 cereal fields in France (14 pairs of conservation and conventional agriculture fields), surveyed weed emergence and biomass, measured crop yield and sampled the main seed predators: carabid beetles and rodents. We found that seed predators activity reduces the yield loss due to weeds by 20%. By extrapolation, it represents an economic gain of 285{euro}/ha. However, the yield loss remains at 60% below the maximum crop yield potential reached in the absence of weeds. Moreover, conservation agriculture enhances weed control, but this does not translate into increased crop yield. This study demonstrates the tangible importance of considering seed predators for weed control but highlights the need to combine this approach with weed control practices or to substantially redesign cropping systems to enhance the beneficial effects of biodiversity on crop productivity. Significance statementAlthough weed biomass is the main driver of decreasing the crop productivity worldwide and the use of herbicides is massively disparaged, we have not yet quantified the role played by on-farm biodiversity to control weeds. Using an experimental design set up in 28 commercial cereal fields in France, we showed that weed seed predators reduce crop yield loss due to weeds by 20%. By extrapolation, it represents an economic gain of 285{euro}/ha. However, in the absence of any other weed control practices, the yield loss remains at 60% below the maximum crop yield potential reached in the absence of weeds. This study demonstrates the quantitative importance of considering seed predators to design pesticide-free systems.

Rice is one of the most important staple food in the world, with irrigated rice paddies largely converted from natural wetlands. The effectiveness of rice fields in help preserve species depends partially on management practices, including the usage of pesticides. However, related studies have focused predominately on the cultivation period, leaving the effects of soil pesticide residues on aquatic invertebrates during the fallow periods little explored; other animals, such as waterbirds, also rely on aquatic invertebrates in flooded fallow fields for their survival. We therefore investigated vertebrates and macroinvertebrates (terrestrial and aquatic) on rice stands and in flooded water during cultivation and fallow periods in organic and conventional rice fields in Taiwan. Association of environmental factors with terrestrial and aquatic organisms was also analyzed. In total, 32,880 individuals of 144 invertebrate families and 381 individuals of 15 vertebrate families were recorded after nine samplings each for six organic and six conventional rice fields. Family richness and abundance of all invertebrates (terrestrial and aquatic) were higher in organic than in conventional fields during the cultivation period, but were similar between the two agricultural practices during the fallow period. Richness and abundance of terrestrial invertebrates in both organic and conventional fields increased with the progression of rice cultivation, so did the differences between the two practices. Richness of aquatic invertebrates was mostly constant across the sampling period, while abundance increased but differences decreased during the fallow period. Richness and abundance of terrestrial invertebrates were positively associated with ambient temperature and height of rice stand. Abundance of aquatic invertebrates were positively associated with pH value and amount of dissolved oxygen but negatively associated with water temperature. Richness and abundance of all vertebrates and each of the constituting groups (fish, amphibian, reptile, bird, and migratory waterbird) were statistically similar between the two practices although abundance of migratory waterbirds in organic fields were two times those in conventional fields during the fallow period. Our study suggested accumulated effects of pesticides on suppressing terrestrial invertebrates during the cultivation period, but diminishing effects of pesticide residues on repressing aquatic invertebrates during the fallow period. This comprehensive study provided a holistic picture on macroinvertebrate and vertebrate fauna, as well as ramifications of pesticide usage, in a representative Southeast Asia rice paddy ecosystem. Further study should compare rice fields with natural wetlands to better assess how to capitalize on agroecosystems for biodiversity conservation.

Knowledge of the specific insect densities during crop development is necessary to perform appropriate measures for the control of insect pests and to minimize yield losses. In a previous study, both spatial and temporal approaches were adopted to analyse the influence of landscape structure and field variables on herbivore and predatory insects on maize. Both types of variables influenced insect abundance, but the highest effect was found with maize phenology. Given that the field planting date could modulate the influence produced by the structure of the landscape on herbivores and predatory insects, analyses of population dynamics must be performed at both the local and landscape levels. The anterior prompted us to study these aspects in the two common planting periods (early and late) in northern Spain. The present study tests the hypothesis that the period of maize planting could have a higher effect than phenology or interannual variation on the abundance of natural enemies and herbivores on maize. Our results showed that only the abundances of other herbivore thrips and Syrphidae were significantly different between the two planting periods. Moreover, we found significant effects of planting period when we performed yearly analysis in 2015 for Coccinellidae and Chrysopidae and in 2016 and 2017 for Aeolothrips sp. Most of the taxa had abundance peaks in earlier growth stages, which are related to pollination (before or during), while only Stethorus punctillum and Syrphidae increased later in the season. Furthermore, Frankliniella occidentalis, aphids, Syrphidae and Coccinellidae registered higher abundances in fields sown in the late planting period than in the rest of the insect species. The results of the present study highlight the effects of sowing dates on insect dynamics in maize. HighlightsO_LIHerbivorous and natural enemy abundance peaks in earlier growth stages. C_LIO_LIAbundance of thrip and Syrphidae were different between the two planting periods. C_LIO_LIAbundance of Coccinellidae, Chrysopidae and Aeolothrips sp. was different when performed yearly analysis. C_LI

Empirical data is key to anticipate the impact of climate change on cropping systems and develop land management strategies that are sustainable while ensuring food security. Here, the combined effects of projected increases in temperature, atmospheric CO2-concentrations, solar irradiation and altered precipitation patterns on winter wheat cropping systems were investigated using an Ecotron. Experimental plant-soil systems were subjected to three different climatic conditions representing a gradient of ongoing climate change implementing the weather patterns of the years 2013, 2068, and 2085 respectively. The wheat plants were grown in two differentially manged agricultural soil types: one with long-term low organic matter (OM) inputs and the other one with long-term high OM inputs. In the low OM system, the risk for plant diseases and nitrate leaching was increased, but it outperformed the high OM system with higher yields and lower CO2-emissions. Developing high-yielding cropping systems leveraging the CO2-fertilisation effect without sacrificing environmental health will therefore require further refined of management practices to improve nutrient cycling and reduce greenhouse gas emissions. One possibility is adapting crop rotations and cover crops to the shorter wheat cycle observed in the future climates to replenish soil nutrients and break disease cycles. Further, in both here studied soil types the wheat plants developed natural coping mechanisms against environmental stressors, such as enhanced root growth and increased levels of proline and silicon. Unravelling the molecular mechanisms that trigger such inherent plant defences is a further interesting target for breeding future crops. Graphical abstract O_FIG O_LINKSMALLFIG WIDTH=177 HEIGHT=200 SRC="FIGDIR/small/626142v2_ufig1.gif" ALT="Figure 1"> View larger version (36K): org.highwire.dtl.DTLVardef@fefc32org.highwire.dtl.DTLVardef@5f6757org.highwire.dtl.DTLVardef@1799ca4org.highwire.dtl.DTLVardef@11aec5c_HPS_FORMAT_FIGEXP M_FIG C_FIG

Arthropods deliver vital ecosystem services in agricultural landscapes, but their diversity is threatened by intensified farming and landscape simplification. Despite this, the relative impacts of farming practices at the landscape level remain underexplored compared to local and land cover effects. In this study, we dissect the influence of local and landscape factors, including farming practices, on arthropod communities. By sampling 18 grasslands in northeastern France during spring and autumn 2021, we collected 14 arthropod families, identifying all species of carabids and spiders. We conducted surveys of farming practices to estimate their intensity at landscape level. Our results highlight that environmental factors affect arthropod communities differently between seasons. Intensity of farming practices at landscape level was less explanatory of arthropod communities, but this impact is additional to that of local conditions and land cover. Our study underscores the critical need to integrate farming practices into landscape-level management strategies to safeguard arthropod diversity.

AimAgriculture depends heavily on biodiversity, yet unsustainable management practices continue to affect a wide range of organisms and ecosystems at unprecedented levels worldwide. Addressing the global challenge of biodiversity loss requires access to consolidated knowledge across management practices, spatial levels, and taxonomic groups. LocationGlobal Time period1994 to 2022 Major taxa studiedAnimals, microorganisms, plants. MethodsWe conducted a comprehensive literature review synthesising data from all meta-analyses about the impacts of agricultural management practices on biodiversity in croplands, covering field, farm, and landscape levels. From 200 retained meta-analyses, we extracted 1,885 mean effect sizes (from 69,850 comparisons between a control and treatment) assessing the impact of management practices on biodiversity, alongside characterising over 9,000 primary papers. ResultsSeven high-income countries, notably the USA, China, and Brazil dominate agricultural impact studies with fertiliser use, phytosanitary interventions and crop diversification receiving widespread attention. The focus on individual practices overshadows research at the farm and landscape level. Taxonomically, Animalia, especially arthropods, are heavily studied while taxa such as annelids and plants receive comparatively less attention. Effect sizes are predominantly calculated from averaged abundance data. Significant gaps persist in terms of studies on the effects of agricultural interventions on specific taxonomic groups (e.g. annelids, mammals) and studies analysing functional traits. Main conclusionsOur study highlights the importance of analysing the effects of combined practices to accurately reflect real-world farming contexts. While abundance metrics are common, reflecting several biodiversity facets and adopting a more balanced research approach across taxa are crucial for understanding biodiversity responses to agricultural changes and informing conservation strategies. Given the unbalanced evidence on impacts of agricultural practices on biodiversity, caution is required when utilising meta-analytical findings for informing public policies or integrating them into global assessment models like life-cycle assessments or global flux models.

O_LIOrganic farming is seen as a prototype of ecological intensification able to conciliate crop productivity and biodiversity conservation in agricultural landscapes. However, how natural enemies, an important functional group supporting pest control services, respond to organic farming at different scales and in different landscape contexts remain unclear.\nC_LIO_LIUsing a hierarchical design within a vineyard-dominated region located in southwestern France, we examine the independent effects of organic farming and semi-natural habitats at the local and landscape scales on natural enemies.\nC_LIO_LIWe show that the proportion of organic farming is a stronger driver of species abundance than the proportion of semi-natural habitats and is an important facet of landscape heterogeneity shaping natural enemy assemblages. Although our study highlight a strong taxonomic group-dependency about the effect of organic farming, organic farming benefits to dominant species while rare species occur at the same frequency in the two farming systems.\nC_LIO_LIIndependently of farming systems, enhancing field age, reducing crop productivity, soil tillage intensity and pesticide use are key management options to increase natural enemy biodiversity.\nC_LIO_LISynthesis and Applications. Our study indicates that policies promoting the expansion of organic farming will benefit more to ecological intensification strategies seeking to enhance ecosystem services than to biodiversity conservation.\nC_LI

Phosphorus (P) availability affects soil carbon (C) cycling such as microbial C use efficiency (CUE) and priming effects (PEs). While non-allophanic Andosols are characterized by high organic C content and strong P retention, the effects of different P fertilization regime on C dynamics in these soils remain poorly understood. In this study, we conducted a 20-day incubation experiment using 13C-enriched glucose to investigate how different soil P levels (Truog-P: 157 mg P kg-1 and 12 mg P kg-1) impacted microbial C dynamics in non-allophanic Andosols from contrasting field management practices. Our results showed that soil organic matter (SOM) priming is associated with P fertilization management, with total primed CO2-C emissions remaining low in these soils. In the high-P soils, glucose and nitrogen (N) addition resulted in negative PEs, whereas in the low-P soils, the same treatment stimulated microbial SOM mining, resulting in positive PEs. Additionally, higher glucose-derived CUE was found in the high-P soils than in low-P soils after 20 days of incubation. These findings suggest that long-term P fertilization influences both substrate-induced microbial assimilation and SOM decomposition, with P limitation potentially promoting SOM mining which, along with concurrent soil acidity and exchangeable Al toxicity, modulates CUE. This study provides insights for improving C sequestration in non-allophanic Andosols through soil fertility management.

Nitrification inhibitor and straw incorporation are widely used to improve crop nitrogen use efficiency in agricultural soil, but their effects on nitrous oxide (N2O) emission across different soil types and the microbial mechanisms remain less understood. In this study, we used controlled experiment and DNA-based molecular analysis to study how nitrification inhibitor (dicyandiamide, DCD) and straw incorporation affect soil nitrogen balance, N2O emission and microbial nitrifiers/denitrifers in three distinct agricultural soils (the black, fluvo-aquic and red soils) across China. Both DCD and straw incorporation improved nitrogen balance by increasing NH4+ and decreasing NO3- in all soils. DCD tended to decrease N2O emission from all soils especially the fluvo-aquic one, while straw incorporation reduced N2O emission only in the fluvo-aquic soil but increased N2O emission in the other two especially the red soil (by [~]600%). T-RFLP analysis revealed that the denitriers community structure are distinct among the three soils but was not strongly affected by DCD or straw incorporation. qPCR analysis revealed that DCD or straw incorporation had no significant effect on nitrifier abundance but increased nitrous oxide reductase nosZ gene abundance in the black/fluvo-aquic soil rather than the red soil. Structural equational modelling further confirmed that, when accounting for treatments and soil properties, nosZ gene abundance is the only biological factor significantly determined N2O emission in different soil types. Taken together, our work advanced the knowledge on the agricultural practices and N2O emission in cropland soils, suggesting that straw incorporation may not be a good choice for the red and black soil areas; management practices should be used as per soil type to balance between nitrogen use efficiency and N2O emission.

Prairies, once spanning the Upper Midwest, have now largely been replaced by agriculture. The lack of resources available to pollinators in agricultural fields and practices commonly employed has led to a decline in insect diversity. To enhance sustainable practices, we must better understand how ecosystem services such as pest control and pollination services provided by a diverse insect and pollinator community scale to current farming practices as related to crop yield and how landscape features may positively contribute to insect and pollinator diversity. We examined how landscape heterogeneity relates to insect and pollinator diversity, as well as how insect and pollinator diversity relates to crop yield across common farming practices. We planted 35 single acre sites of Brassica carinata, a generalist flower possibly capable of supporting a diverse insect community. We randomly assigned each site with a combination of three common farming practices: tilling (yes/no), added honey bee hives (yes/no), and treatment with systemic neonicotinoids (yes/no). Insect and pollinator diversity and the surrounding landscape at multiple spatial scales were calculated. We observed a significant positive relationship between insect (and pollinator) diversity with yield in the absence of any farming practice. All farming practices will increase yield. However, farming practices alter the relationship between yield and diversity. The addition of seed treatment or tillage negates the relationship between insect (and pollinator) diversity with yield. Seed treatment alone results in a flat relationship between diversity and yield for all insects and a negative relationship for pollinators. Increased landscape heterogeneity results in a positive relationship between insect diversity at the 1000 m scale and pollinator diversity at the 3000 m scale, suggesting large-scale heterogeneity contributes to overall insect diversity. Our results show that increasing large-scale landscape heterogeneity increases diversity serving as a substitute for common farming practices such as application of pesticides, tilling, or bee hives. Increased heterogeneity could save farmers from the input cost of treatment or tillage, by way of increased insect diversity, while still providing similar yields.

O_LIAgricultural intensification has altered the provision of natural bioregulation. We assessed the effects of five different crops under non-inversion tillage on the temporal dynamics of carabid assemblages. We evaluated how the taxonomic diversity, the composition, and the diet-based functional structure of communities varied over the spring period. C_LIO_LICarabid assemblages were monitored over 4 years (from 2009 to 2012), in a total of 67 fields (each field followed one year) cropped with either winter oilseed rape, winter wheat, sugar beet, spring barley, or spring pea. We assigned a relative diet profile to each species accounting for more than 0.5 % of the total mean abundance-activity: granivorous, phytophagous, and zoophagous. C_LIO_LIThe seasonal changes in species richness, abundance-activity, and evenness had the same dynamic in all crops. Despite differences in species identities between crops, the zoophagous and phytophagous diet profiles showed similar temporal dynamics in all crop types, suggesting a high functional equivalence among species present in cultivated fields. Zoophagous species were progressively replaced by primarily phytophagous species in all crops, while the increase in granivorous species was only observed in oilseed rape. C_LIO_LIOur results suggest that potential bioregulation do not significantly differ among crop types but vary along the spring season. C_LI HighlightsO_LIWe monitored carabid communities in five crop types under non-inversion tillage C_LIO_LIWe observed similar seasonal increases in carabid abundance-activity and species richness in all crops during the spring period C_LIO_LIWe observed similar trends in temporal changes in carnivorous and phytophagous diet profiles in all crops C_LIO_LIWith seasonal changes, zoophagous species are progressively replaced by more phytophagous species C_LIO_LICrop type is not the main factor driving temporal changes in diet-based structure of carabid assemblages C_LI

O_LIEffective pest control requires a better understanding of natural enemy ecology, particularly how their distribution responds to landscape structure and local management. Agricultural intensification has simplified landscapes, reducing biodiversity and constraining pest control. Landscape-scale surveys are therefore needed to identify strategies that support natural enemies in agricultural systems. C_LIO_LIFrom 2021 to 2022, over three seasons, we surveyed 25 clementine orchards across a gradient of landscape complexity in Corsica. We modelled the tree-level occurrence of four natural enemy species in relation to ecological context across multiple spatial and temporal scales. Site-level evenness, reflecting differences in species occurrence frequencies, was also estimated to assess how natural enemy assemblages vary across local management and landscape gradients. C_LIO_LIClimate and local management were the primary drivers of species occurrence, with additional contributions from landscape factors. Species displayed distinct responses, while model performance increased with the number of sampled trees, plateauing at around half of the sampling effort. C_LIO_LISite-level evenness was higher in organic orchards than in conventional orchards. In conventional orchards, it responded to landscape structure in a scale-dependent manner, increasing at the larger scale with the heterogeneity and spatial continuity of semi-natural habitats. C_LIO_LISynthesis and applications. Organic farming enhances natural enemy presence and diversity in Corsican citrus orchards, while the naturalness and complexity of surrounding landscape can mitigate species scarcity in conventional orchards. We recommend continued long-term monitoring of arthropod communities in these systems, prioritizing the number of sampling sites and years while reducing the number of trees sampled per site to optimize effort. C_LI

Spontaneous plant communities have undergone considerable constraints due to human-mediated changes. Understanding how plant communities are shifting in response to land management and climate changes is necessary to predict future ecosystem functioning and improve the resilience of managed ecosystems, such as agroecosystems. Using Mediterranean weed communities as models of managed plant communities in a climate change hotspot, we quantified to which extent they have shifted from the 1980s to the 2020s in response to climate and management changes in vineyards. In four decades, the annual range of temperatures (i.e. the difference between the warmest months and the coldest months mean temperatures) increased by 1.2{degrees}C and the summer temperatures by 2{degrees}C. Weed management diversified over time with the adoption of mowing that replaced the chemical weeding of inter-rows. Current weed communities were 41% more abundant, 24% more diverse and with a less even distribution of abundance across species than the 1980s communities at the vineyard level. Modern communities were composed of more annual species (57% of annual species in the 1980s versus 80% in the 2020s) with lower lateral spreadability and seed mass and were composed of fewer C4 species. They had higher community-weighted specific leaf area, higher leaf dry matter content and lower leaf area than 1980s weed communities. At the community level, the onset of flowering was earlier and the duration of flowering was longer in the 2020s. Climate change induced more stress-tolerant communities in the 2020s while the diversification of weed management practices over time filtered less competitive communities. This study shows that plant communities are adapting to climate change and that land management is a strong lever for action to model more diverse and functional plant communities in the future.

Land-use change and ecological invasion are two main drivers of biodiversity loss, and the restoration of semi-natural wet grasslands is needed to tackle invasive species and re-establish grassland biodiversity on former forest plantations. This study tested the effectiveness of two widely used management techniques (grazing by traditional Hungarian Grey cattle and mowing once a year in August) as a restoration method of wet meadows in a former forest plantation invaded by goldenrod species in Central Hungary. We compared the vegetation composition of grazed, mowed, and reference areas with semi-natural wet meadow vegetation based on plant biomass, species richness and cover of species groups of species origin, life span, growth form, and social behaviour types of Borhidi determining the grazing value and the nature conservation value of the grasslands. We found that grazing by Hungarian Grey cattle resulted in a vegetation that was more similar to the reference wet meadows than mowing once a year in late summer. Grazing was superior to mowing in terms of goldenrod control, total species richness and cover, as well as the abundance of natives, perennials, herbs, and legumes. However, in the grazed area, we detected more disturbance-tolerant and annual species than in the mowed area. Despite the improved vegetation condition in the grazed area, we identified substantial disparities between the grazed and reference areas after three years of grazing. Based on our results, we advise using continuous extensive grazing to restore and maintain semi-natural wet meadows.