Hedgerows enhance beneficial insects on adjacent tomato fields in an intensive agricultural landscape

Abstract

a b s t r a c tWithin-farm habitat enhancements such as hedgerows could aid pest control in adjacent crops; however, there is little information on whether small-scale restoration impacts pests and natural enemies, and crop damage, and how far effects may extend into fields. We compared restored, California native perennial hedgerows to unenhanced field edges consisting of commonly occurring semi-managed, nonnative weeds. Pest and natural enemy communities were assessed in both edge types and into adjacent processing tomato fields. Using sentinel pest eggs, pest control was quantified, and pest pressure and crop damage was compared between field types. Economically-important pests were fewer and parasitoid wasps were more abundant in hedgerows than weedy crop edges. There was no difference in predatory arthropod abundance between edge types, but there was greater predator richness in hedgerow than weedy edges. Predatory lady beetles were more abundant and aphids were lower in fields with hedgerows, up to 200 m into fields, the maximum extent of observations. Fewer of the fields adjacent to hedgerows reached threshold pest levels requiring insecticide application. Benefits of hedgerows to pest control from parasitism extended to 100 m but not 200 m into fields. Farm-scale hedgerow restoration can provide pest control benefits up to 100 or 200 m into fields and multiple hedgerows around fields could enhance pest control throughout entire fields, reducing the need for chemical pest control.

Effects of landscape configuration on mapping ecosystem service capacity: a review of evidence and a case study in Scotland

“…An increase in natural enemy populations does not necessarily translate into increased pest control, because pest species populations can also respond positively to increasing Landscape Ecol (2016) 31:1457-14791459 landscape complexity (Bianchi et al 2006;ChaplinKramer et al 2011). The same issue applies to studies on linear elements and pest control, although Morandin et al (2014) show that fields adjacent to hedgerows less frequently reach pest pressure levels that require insecticides use. For flood control there is evidence for an effect of configuration on ES capacity.…”

“…Linear elements can greatly reduce runoff (Borin et al 2010) and in the UK the presence of individual trees and shelterbelts increases the infiltration capacity of grazed pastures (Marshall et al 2009). The effect of land cover depends however on the amount of rainfall and diminishes with increasing soil saturation (Lull Pisani et al (2013), Macfadyen and Muller (2013), Veres et al (2013), Bianchi et al (2013), Martin et al (2013), Rusch et al (2013), Mitchell et al (2014), Morandin et al (2014) f Svensson et al (2000), Kells et al (2001), Potts et al (2003), Kremen et al (2004), Bodin et al (2006), Williams and Kremen (2007), Ricketts et al (2008), Winfree et al (2009), Isaacs andKirk (2010), Kennedy et al (2013), Morandin and Kremen (2013), Rollin et al (2013), Bailey et al (2014), Stanley and Stout (2014) g de la Fuente de Val et al (2006), Dramstad et al (2006), Borin et al (2010), Kienast et al (2012), van Zanten et al (2014 h Castelle et al (1994), Bartley et al (2006), Ludwig et al (2007), Bu et al (2008), Lenka et al (2012), Yang et al (2012), Shi et al (2013) and Reinhart 1972;Calder 2007;Acreman and Holden 2013). In mountainous catchments the riparian z...…”

An evaluation of insectary plants for management of insect pests in a hydroponic cropping system

“…The planting of insectary plants along crop borders to provide nectar, pollen or nesting shelter for beneficial organisms has mostly been conducted in terrestrial cropping systems with insectary plants used as field borders, living mulches or intercropped with cash crops (Dyer and Landis, 1997;Hickman and Wratten, 1996;Hooks and Johnson, 2003Morandin et al, 2014). To our knowledge, this strategy had not yet been evaluated in a hydroponic system where space for insectary plants is limited.…”

Spill-over of pest control and pollination services into arable crops

“…This is likely to become increasingly true in the future where precision farming allows the possibility for spatial complementarity between conventional and nature conservation based strategies (Stafford, 2000). However, the quantification of spill-over for both pest control and pollination providing taxa and the ecosystem services they support remains poorly defined (but see Bailey et al, 2014;Morandin et al, 2014;Saunders and Luck, 2014).…”