Vigyázzunk a keskeny sávokkal - Új cikk az AGEE-ben

Tölgyesi Csaba elsőszerzőségével megjelent - a karácsonyfa alá kerülve - legújabb cikkünk az Agriculture, Ecosystems and Environment nemzetközi folyóiratban. A cikk eltérő szélességű kezeletlen sávok hatásának vizsgálatával nyert eredményeket mutatja be ízeltlábú populációk mozgásán (spillover) keresztül. A cikk ezen a linken keresztül 50 napig, 2018 február 11-ig, ingyenesen letölthető, ezt köetően a honlapomon keresztül elérhető lesz. A közlemény összefoglalója az alábbiakban olvasható.

Think twice before using narrow buffers: Attenuating mowing-induced arthropod spillover at forest – grassland edges

Tölgyesi Cs., Császár P., Torma A., Török P., Bátori Z., Gallé R.   

Spillover between agricultural land and natural habitats is recognised as an important mechanism shaping biodiversity and ecosystem functions. Its spatio-temporal patterns and magnitude are thoroughly described in the literature and it is often stated that spillover should be considered in conservation planning. In fact studies that implement and test active interventions to modulate spillover are scarce. Therefore, we studied the spillover of spiders and carabids between hay meadows and natural forests after mowing and tested whether leaving unmown buffer strips in the edges can mitigate undesirable aspects of mowing-induced spillover. We found that mowing affected the assemblages both in the meadows and forests and, interestingly, changes were more profound in the forests. Mowing reduced the spillover of forest assemblages into meadows. Mowing also led to the retraction of forest assemblages from the peripheral zones of forests but did not trigger an influx of meadow assemblages into the forests. Wide (10?m) unmown buffers attenuated or completely offset most of these effects. Leaving narrow (5?m) buffers had unexpected consequences, as they did not function only as buffers but as facilitators of forest-ward spillover from meadows, potentially compromising ecological interactions such as predation or competition in forests. We conclude that using wide buffers can be recommended as a refinement of standard management practices in hay meadow–forest mosaics. Narrow buffers should be applied with great caution and should generally be avoided if the forest-specific assemblages are of conservation interest.