TY - GEN A1 - Effiom, Edu O. A1 - Birkhofer, Klaus A1 - Smith, Henrik G. A1 - Olsson, Ola T1 - Changes of community composition at multiple trophic levels due to hunting in Nigerian tropical forests T2 - Ecography Y1 - 2014 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1600-0587.2013.00359.x SN - 1600-0587 VL - 37 IS - 4 SP - 367 EP - 377 ER - TY - GEN A1 - Rader, Romina A1 - Birkhofer, Klaus A1 - Schmucki, Reto A1 - Smith, Henrik G. A1 - Stjernman, Martin A1 - Lindborg, Regina T1 - Organic farming and heterogeneous landscapes positively affect different measures of plant diversity T2 - Journal of applied ecology Y1 - 2014 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1111/1365-2664.12344 SN - 1365-2664 VL - 51 IS - 6 SP - 1544 EP - 1553 ER - TY - GEN A1 - Birkhofer, Klaus A1 - Smith, Henrik G. A1 - Rundlöf, Maj T1 - Environmental Impacts of Organic Farming T2 - eLS - Wiley Online Library N2 - Organic agriculture is a production system that aims at sustaining healthy soils, ecosystems and people by prohibiting the application of synthetic pesticides and fertilisers in crop production and by emphasising animal welfare in livestock breeding. This article shows that organic agriculture is characterised by higher soil quality and reduced nutrient or pesticide leaching compared to nonorganic agriculture, but that positive effects on biological control services or emission of greenhouse gases are less evident. Yield gaps between organic and nonorganic agriculture are on average 20%, but vary between crops and regions. Given the environmental risks that are associated with intensive, nonorganic agriculture, farming practices should be modified to decrease risks. Organic agriculture can be a more environmentally friendly alternative, but individual farming practices need improvement to meet the demands of a growing human population. Further growth of the organic farming sector will contribute to reduce the negative environmental impact of agriculture. Y1 - 2016 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1002/9780470015902.a0026341 SP - 1 EP - 7 ER - TY - GEN A1 - Birkhofer, Klaus A1 - Smith, Henrik G. A1 - Weisser, Wolfgang W. A1 - Wolters, Volkmar A1 - Gossner, Martin M. T1 - Land-use effects on the functional distinctness of arthropod communities T2 - Ecography N2 - Land-use change is a major driver of the global loss of biodiversity, but it is unclear to what extent this also results in a loss of ecological traits. Therefore, a better understanding of how land-use change affects ecological traits is crucial for efforts to sustain functional diversity. To this end we tested whether higher species richness or taxonomic distinctness generally leads to increased functional distinctness and whether intensive land use leads to functionally more narrow arthropod communities. We compiled species composition and trait data for 350 species of terrestrial arthropods (Araneae, Carabidae and Heteroptera) in different land-use types (forests, grasslands and arable fields) of low and high land-use intensity. We calculated the average functional and taxonomic distinctness and the rarified trait richness for each community. These measures reflect the range of traits, taxonomic relatedness and number of traits that are observed in local communities. Average functional distinctness only increased significantly with species richness in Carabidae communities. Functional distinctness increased significantly with taxonomic distinctness in communities of all analyzed taxa suggesting a high functional redundancy of taxonomically closely related species. Araneae and Heteroptera communities had the expected lower functional distinctness at sites with higher land-use intensity. More frequently disturbed land-use types such as managed grasslands or arable fields were characterized by species with smaller body sizes and higher dispersal abilities and communities with lower functional distinctness or trait richness. Simple recommendations about the conservation of functional distinctness of arthropod communities in the face of future land-use intensification and species loss are not possible. Our study shows that these relationships depend on the studied taxa and land-use type. However, for some arthropod groups functional distinctness is threatened by intensification and conversion from less to more frequently disturbed land-uses. Y1 - 2015 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1111/ecog.01141 SN - 0906-7590 VL - 38 IS - 9 SP - 889 EP - 900 ER - TY - CHAP A1 - Birkhofer, Klaus A1 - Diehl, Eva A1 - Wolters, Volkmar A1 - Smith, Henrik G. T1 - Global metawebs of spider predation highlight consequences of land-use change for terrestrial predator-prey networks T2 - Adaptive Food Webs – Stability and Transitions of Real and Model Ecosystems Y1 - 2017 SN - 978-1-107-18211-0 SP - 193 EP - 213 PB - Cambridge University Press CY - Cambridge ER - TY - GEN A1 - Birkhofer, Klaus A1 - Fevrier, Valentin A1 - Heinrich, Anna Eva A1 - Rink, Katharina A1 - Smith, Henrik G. T1 - The contribution of CAP greening measures to conservation biological control at two spatial scales T2 - Agriculture, Ecosystem & Environment N2 - To promote a more sustainable agricultural production, the European Commission implemented direct payments that require farmers to implement greening measures aimed at reducing negative effects of agriculture on the environment and biodiversity. These greening measures (including fallows and permanent grasslands) have been criticised for their potential inability to conserve biodiversity and promote associated ecosystem services. In this study, we investigate if the presence of old or recently established fallows and permanent grassland in the landscape are beneficial for the emergence, activity density and spillover of ground-running natural enemies and as a result aphid biological control in cereal fields. Lycosidae and Theridiidae were more numerous in fallows (emergence & activity density) compared to crop fields, while Staphylinidae and Linyphiidae showed opposite patterns. Spillover of Lycosidae was significantly higher from fallows into cereal fields, than between cereal fields. As a result of the opposite patterns in activity density in fallows between different groups of predators, a spillover from fallows did not result in a significantly higher aphid control in crop fields adjacent to them. A high proportion of permanent grassland in the landscape resulted in lower emergence of Linyphiidae and Carabidae. Our results support the assumption that a higher emergence and activity density of ground-running predators generally results in higher spillover to adjacent fields. However, patterns of emergence and activity density differed between individual natural enemy groups. Fallows, independent of age, can therefore act as source or sink depending on the focal predator group and more permanent grassland in the landscape can result in lower local emergence. Fallows at the local scale and permanent grassland at larger spatial scales therefore did not generally promote aphid biological control services provided by ground-running natural enemies. Y1 - 2018 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1016/j.agee.2017.12.026 SN - 1873-2305 IS - 255 SP - 84 EP - 94 ER - TY - GEN A1 - Birkhofer, Klaus A1 - Andersson, Georg K. S. A1 - Bengtsson, Janne A1 - Bommarco, Riccardo A1 - Dänhardt, Juliana A1 - Ekbom, Barbara A1 - Ekroos, Johan A1 - Hahn, Thomas A1 - Hedlund, Katarina A1 - Jönnson, Annelie M. A1 - Lindborg, Regina A1 - Olsson, Ola A1 - Rader, Romina A1 - Rusch, Adrien A1 - Stjernman, Martin A1 - Williams, Alwyn A1 - Smith, Henrik G. T1 - Relationships between multiple biodiversity components and ecosystem services along a landscape complexity gradient T2 - Biological Conservation Y1 - 2018 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biocon.2017.12.027 SN - 1873-2917 VL - 218 SP - 247 EP - 253 ER - TY - GEN A1 - Birkhofer, Klaus A1 - Gossner, Martin M. A1 - Diekötter, Tim A1 - Drees, Claudia A1 - Ferlian, Olga A1 - Maraun, Mark A1 - Scheu, Stefan A1 - Weisser, Wolfgang W. A1 - Wolters, Volkmar A1 - Wurst, Susanne A1 - Zaitsev, Andrey S. A1 - Smith, Henrik G. T1 - Land-use type and intensity differentially filter traits in above- and below-ground arthropod communities T2 - Journal of Animal Ecology Y1 - 2017 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1111/1365-2656.12641 SN - 1365-2656 VL - 86 IS - 3 SP - 511 EP - 520 ER - TY - GEN A1 - Nilsson, Lovisa A1 - Andersson, Georg K. S. A1 - Birkhofer, Klaus A1 - Smith, Henrik G. T1 - Ignoring ecosystem-service cascades undermines policy for multifunctional agricultural landscapes T2 - Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution Y1 - 2017 U6 - https://doi.org/10.3389/fevo.2017.00109 SN - 2296-701X IS - 5 ER - TY - GEN A1 - Hansen, Helena I. A1 - Birkhofer, Klaus A1 - Smith, Henrik G. A1 - Palmu, Erkki A1 - Hedlund, Katarina T1 - Agricultural land use affects abundance and dispersal tendency of predatory arthropods T2 - Basic and Applied Ecology N2 - Predatory arthropods contribute to biological control, but to become an integral part of agricultural management, it is essential to identify drivers of their spatio-temporal distribution at the landscape scale. This study focuses on how agricultural land use affects the community composition, emergence and dispersal tendency of predatory arthropods. The arthropods were collected in emergence traps during the growing season (14 weeks) in a gradient of agricultural land uses from intensively managed sugar beet fields, over winter wheat fields, to less intensively managed grasslands. The emergence traps were equipped with one pitfall trap and a collecting bottle at the top. The distribution of the arthropods between these two collecting methods was assumed to represent their tendency to move out of the habitat. The grasslands had the highest numbers of spiders, while the winter wheat fields had the highest numbers of omnivorous rove beetles and macropterous predaceous ground beetles. The phenology of emergence differed between the land-use types, resulting in seasonal differences in community composition. The overall dispersal tendency of predatory arthropods was higher in crop fields than in grasslands. This study suggests that only a diverse mix of agricultural land uses will provide high levels of predators from different functional groups, throughout the growing season. Y1 - 2017 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1016/j.baae.2016.10.004 SN - 1618-0089 SN - 1439-1791 IS - 18 SP - 40 EP - 49 ER -