How does roadside vegetation management affect the diversity of vascular plants and invertebrates? A systematic review protocol

Abstract

Background: Roadsides have been acknowledged as potential substitutes for semi-natural grasslands and other open habitats with high biodiversity, many of which are now declining. Current recommendations for roadside management to promote conservation of biodiversity are largely based on studies of plants in meadows or pastures, although such areas often differ from roadsides in terms of environmental conditions and disturbance regimes. Stakeholders in Sweden have emphasised the need for more targeted guidelines for roadside management, based on actual roadside studies. We recently performed a systematic mapping of the evidence on how roadside management affects biodiversity and the dispersal of species. Through this process, we found 98 studies on how the richness or abundance of species on roadsides is affected by management such as regular mowing, burning, grazing or selective mechanical removal of plants. Since all of these interventions entail removal of plant biomass, they are comparable. Most of the studies recorded management effects on vascular plants, but there were 14 investigations of insects and other invertebrates. We now intend to proceed with a full systematic review of how maintenance or restoration of roadsides based on non-chemical vegetation removal affects the diversity of vascular plants and invertebrates.Methods: Most of the evidence on which the proposed systematic review is to be based will be selected from the systematic map. To identify more recently published literature on the topic of the review, we will perform a search update using a subset of the search terms applied for the systematic map. The criteria for inclusion of studies will be the same as for the map, except that interventions and outcomes will be restricted to those relevant to the review. Relevant studies will be subject to critical appraisal and categorised as having high or low validity for the review. Studies with low validity will be excluded from the review. Utilisable data on outcomes, interventions and other potential effect modifiers will be extracted from included articles. A narrative synthesis will describe the validity and findings of all studies in the review. Where a sufficient number of studies report similar outcome types, meta-analysis will be conducted.

Roadsides provide refuge for orchids: characteristic of the surrounding landscape

“…Nonetheless, the conservation importance of roadsides is not to be underrated due to these facts, since these corridors most likely still function as linear reserves for plants (Forman, 1991). Consequently, the conservation value of these narrow fragments of seminatural habitats is becoming increasingly appreciated worldwide (Bernes et al., 2017; Hopper, 1990; Melman & Verkaar, 1991; Niu et al., 2019; Ryttäri & Kettunen, 1997; Saunders & Hobbs, 1991), and in some countries, they have been identified as Sites of Special Scientific Interest (Parr & Way, 1988).…”

How does roadside vegetation management affect the diversity of vascular plants and invertebrates? A systematic review

“…Our review follows the guidelines for systematic reviews in environmental management issued by the Collaboration for Environmental Evidence [20,21]. The design of the review was established in detail in a peer-reviewed protocol [22].…”

A five-step approach for stakeholder engagement in prioritisation and planning of environmental evidence syntheses

“…For example, EviEM's ongoing review of roadside management [40] was initially intended to cover management effects on vascular plants and all kinds of animals, but when the protocol was open for public review, one stakeholder pointed out that studies of mammals and birds along roadsides may often be difficult to use as evidence of management effects. After careful consideration, the review team decided not to include effects on vertebrates in the review, but to focus on vascular plants and invertebrates instead.…”