Flower power in the city: Replacing roadside shrubs by wildflower meadows increases insect numbers and reduces maintenance costs

Mody, Karsten; Lerch, Doris; Müller, Ann-Kathrin; Simons, Nadja K.; Blüthgen, Nico; Harnisch, Matthias

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0234327

Cited by 47 publications

(23 citation statements)

References 148 publications

(192 reference statements)

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“…Major roads can, thus, create a suitable habitat for shrub-dwelling orthopterans (especially ensiferans, such as Oecanthus pellucens, Pachytrachis gracilis, P. striolatus and Pholidoptera femorata, in this study) that would not be able to inhabit or would occur in much lower numbers in the surrounding grasslands [65]. Previous studies have suggested the potential of vegetated roadsides and railway verges as both supplementary habitats and refugia for Orthoptera in urban environments [33,78], but our results indicate that this could also be the case in (semi)natural landscapes, at least for certain functional groups. Most of the shrub-dwelling species recorded here are also omnivorous, their generalist feeding habits likely providing an additional advantage in a disturbed environment selecting against specialist herbivores [36].…”

Section: Road-associated Changes In Functional Trait Compositionmentioning

confidence: 65%

Vegetation Height as the Primary Driver of Functional Changes in Orthopteran Assemblages in a Roadside Habitat

Rebrina

Reinhold

Tvrtković

et al. 2022

Insects

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Exhibiting manifold ecological impacts on terrestrial biota, roads have become a major driver of environmental change nowadays. However, many insect groups with high indication potential, such as grasshoppers and crickets (Orthoptera), have been largely neglected in road ecology research from a functional perspective. Using two complementary sampling methods, we have investigated the spatial dynamics of functional diversity and six functional traits in orthopteran assemblages, with respect to motorway proximity and the associated environmental factors, in a grassland habitat in the Lika region, Croatia. This research shows, for the first time, that road proximity can facilitate an increase in the functional diversity of orthopteran assemblages, with shifts in functional traits related to mobility, feeding habits and lifestyle being primarily driven by changes in vegetation height. Our findings also suggest that our ability to detect road-related patterns depends on the choice of a diversity measure and sampling method, since different components of orthopteran assemblages (plant-dwelling vs. ground-dwelling) exhibit different functional responses to road proximity.

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Section: Road-associated Changes In Functional Trait Compositionmentioning

confidence: 65%

Vegetation Height as the Primary Driver of Functional Changes in Orthopteran Assemblages in a Roadside Habitat

Rebrina

Reinhold

Tvrtković

et al. 2022

Insects

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“…In large part, this may be due to the reduced vegetation biomass and productivity per unit area in urban habitats where much of the landscape is impervious surface, such as cement or rooftops (Uhler et al, 2021). While studies that focus on local, green habitats in cities often find those habitats to be biological-diverse (Brunbjerg et al, 2018;Guénard et al, 2015;Mody et al, 2020;Theodorou et al, 2020;Turrini & Knop, 2015), such studies may risk missing the broader picture that the unsampled grey spaces of cities are likely to have low biomass, a reality reflected in our results from both Denmark and Germany.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Flying insect biomass is negatively associated with urban cover in surrounding landscapes

Svenningsen

Bowler

Hecker

et al. 2022

Diversity and Distributions

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Aim In this study, we assessed the importance of local‐ to landscape‐scale effects of land cover and land use on flying insect biomass. Location Denmark and parts of Germany. Methods We used rooftop‐mounted car nets in a citizen science project (“InsectMobile”) to allow for large‐scale geographic sampling of flying insects. Volunteers sampled insects along 278 five‐km routes in urban, farmland, grassland, wetland and forest landscapes in the summer of 2018. The bulk insect samples were dried overnight to obtain the sample biomass. We extracted proportional land use variables in buffers between 50 and 1,000 m along the routes and compiled them into land cover categories to examine the effect of each land cover, and specific land use types, on insect biomass. Results We found a negative association between urban cover and flying insect biomass (1% increase in urban cover = 1% [95% CI: −3.0 to 0.0] decrease in biomass in Denmark, and a 3% [95% CI: −3.0 to 0.0] decrease in Germany) at a landscape scale (1,000‐m buffer). In Denmark, we also found positive effects of semi‐natural land cover types, that is protected grassland (largest at the landscape scale, 1000 m) and forests (largest at intermediate scales, 250 m). Protected grassland cover had a stronger positive effect on insect biomass than forest cover did. For farmland cover, the positive association with insect biomass was not clearly modified by any variable associated with farmland use intensity. The negative association between insect biomass and urban land cover appeared to be reduced by increased urban green space. Main conclusions Our results show that land cover has an impact on flying insect biomass with the magnitude of this effect varying across spatial scales. However, the vast expanse of grey space in urbanized areas has a direct negative impact on flying insect biomass across all spatial scales examined.

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“…This makes orthopterans reliable indicators of, for example, vegetation succession, overgrazing, eutrophication and changes in land management, both at the species and assemblage levels (Fartmann et al, 2012;Gardiner, 2018). A recent study has shown that the type of roadside vegetation (meadow vs. woody plants) affects orthopteran abundance (Mody et al, 2020), but no previous research has investigated spatial dynamics of orthopteran assemblages in relation to road-induced changes in vegetation cover and microclimatic factors.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Motorway proximity affects spatial dynamics of orthopteran assemblages in a grassland ecosystem

Rebrina

Reinhold

Tvrtković

et al. 2021

Insect Conserv Diversity

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1. Major roads have become significant components of environmental change but their impacts on invertebrate assemblages are insufficiently understood, and therefore rarely considered in road-planning and management.2. In the current study, we test (i) whether and how orthopteran assemblages change with distance from a motorway, and (ii) how road-induced changes in noise level, vegetation height and microclimate affect assemblage metrics and spatial distribution of orthopteran species.3. In 2018, we sampled orthopterans at five distances from a motorway: 10, 25, 50, 100 and 500 m, in eight locations within homogeneous portions of a grassland habitat in Lika region, Croatia, using two sampling methods: pitfall trapping and sweep-netting.4. Orthopteran abundance, species richness, true diversity and conservation value decreased at the sites closest to the motorway in the pitfall dataset, primarily due to negative responses of species with low-frequency acoustic signals.5. Road-influenced vegetation height had a stronger overall impact on orthopteran assemblages than traffic noise and/or microclimate; increased diversity and conservation value at 25 m from the motorway suggest an effect similar to early stages of vegetation succession.6. This study shows, for the first time, that a major road can induce changes in adjacent orthopteran assemblages, but negative impacts are confined to a narrow zone.7. Our results indicate that road-induced changes in orthopteran assemblages could be more efficiently assessed using pitfall trapping than sweep-netting.8. Increasing heterogeneity of roadside habitats by appropriate vegetation management could help mitigating negative road impacts on Orthoptera in the study area, while contributing to higher diversity of their assemblages.

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Flower power in the city: Replacing roadside shrubs by wildflower meadows increases insect numbers and reduces maintenance costs

Cited by 47 publications

References 148 publications

Vegetation Height as the Primary Driver of Functional Changes in Orthopteran Assemblages in a Roadside Habitat

Vegetation Height as the Primary Driver of Functional Changes in Orthopteran Assemblages in a Roadside Habitat

Flying insect biomass is negatively associated with urban cover in surrounding landscapes

Motorway proximity affects spatial dynamics of orthopteran assemblages in a grassland ecosystem

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