Disentangling the seasonal effects of agricultural intensification on birds and bats in Mediterranean olive groves
Fecha
2023Autor
Versión
Acceso abierto / Sarbide irekia
Tipo
Artículo / Artikulua
Versión
Versión publicada / Argitaratu den bertsioa
Impacto
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10.1016/j.agee.2022.108280
Resumen
Assessing the spatio-temporal impact of agricultural intensification on species and communities is key for biodiversity conservation. Here, we investigated the seasonal effects of olive grove intensification at both local (farming practices and grove structural complexity) and landscape scale (land-cover diversity) on birds and bats, at species and community-level. Both groups were surveyed durin ...
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Assessing the spatio-temporal impact of agricultural intensification on species and communities is key for biodiversity conservation. Here, we investigated the seasonal effects of olive grove intensification at both local (farming practices and grove structural complexity) and landscape scale (land-cover diversity) on birds and bats, at species and community-level. Both groups were surveyed during spring, summer, and autumn in 60 sites representing varying levels of olive grove intensification throughout the Alentejo region (southern Portugal). At the local scale, the number of chemical applications was used as a proxy for the intensification of farming practices and a Structural Index, which accounted for within-grove variability in tree density and features, was used as a measure of grove structural complexity. At landscape scale, we quantified the proportion of the major land-cover types potentially affecting birds and bats. We found that the abundance of ca. 77% of the species analyzed (ca. 84% and 55% of birds and bats respectively) was negatively related to olive grove intensification in at least one season. The Structural Index was the most influential factor at both species and community-levels, especially for birds, with a consistent and strong effect across seasons. Chemical applications had a stronger negative effect on birds, whereas the amount of olive grove cover had a stronger detrimental effect on bats. Birds and bats showed a variable response to predictor variables depending on the season, particularly for the bat community. Our study shows differences in bird and bat responses associated with the spatio-temporal variability of the agricultural intensification components. On the one hand, birds and bats showed a seasonal pattern of association with the different components of olive grove intensification, probably due to their ecological and biological requirements. On the other hand, the responses of both groups also appear to be scale-dependent: while birds seem to respond to in-farm or local intensification more strongly, bats seem to be more influenced by landscape-scale simplification. Overall, we highlight the importance of the structural complexity of olive groves for birds and bats, an aspect that should be considered in the design of agricultural policies aiming to promote biodiversity conservation. [--]
Materias
Agricultural intensification,
Biodiversity conservation in agroecosystems,
Birds and bats,
Grove structural complexity,
Olive groves
Editor
Elsevier
Publicado en
Agriculture, Ecosystems and Environment 343 (2023) 108280
Departamento
Universidad Pública de Navarra. Departamento de Ciencias /
Nafarroako Unibertsitate Publikoa. Zientziak Saila /
Universidad Pública de Navarra/Nafarroako Unibertsitate Publikoa. Institute for Multidisciplinary Research in Applied Biology - IMAB
Versión del editor
Entidades Financiadoras
This research was funded by the Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT) under PTDC/AAG-REC/6480/2014 project and by the regional European Program Alentejo 2020 through the ALT20-03-0145-FEDER-343 000008 project. The study has also received funding from the project SHOWCASE within the European Union’s Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation Programme under grant agreement No. 862480. Authors were supported by the FCT through fellowships and contracts SFRH/BD/133017/2017 (GJ-N), SFRH/BD/137803/2018 (BS), SFRH/BD/121388/2016 (SV), SFRH/BD/99746/2014 (RM), IF/00001/2015 (JMH) and IF/01053/2015 (FM). JRP was funded from “la Caixa” and “Caja Navarra” Foundation, LCF/PR/PR13/51080004.