Contrasting success in the restoration of plant and phytophagous beetle assemblages of species-rich mesotrophic grasslands |
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Authors: | B A Woodcock A R Edwards C S Lawson D B Westbury A J Brook S J Harris V K Brown S R Mortimer |
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Institution: | (1) Centre for Agri-Environmental Research, Department of Agriculture, The University of Reading, Earley Gate, PO Box 237, Reading, RG6 6AR, UK |
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Abstract: | Over the last 60 years changes to the management of species-rich mesotrophic grasslands have resulted in the large-scale loss
and degradation of this habitat across Europe. Restoration of such grasslands on agriculturally improved pastures provides
a potentially valuable approach to the conservation of these threatened areas. Over a four-year period a replicated block
design was used to test the effects of seed addition (green hay spreading and brush harvest collection) and soil disturbance
on the restoration of phytophagous beetle and plant communities. Patterns of increasing restoration success, particularly
where hay spreading and soil disturbance were used in combination, were identified for the phytophagous beetles. In the case
of the plants, however, initial differences in restoration success in response to these same treatments were not followed
by subsequent temporal changes in plant community similarity to target mesotrophic grassland. It is possible that the long-term
consequences of the management treatments would not be the establishment of beetle and plant communities characteristic of
the targets for restoration. Restoration management to enhance plant establishment using hay spreading and soil disturbance
techniques would, however, still increase community similarity in both taxa to that of species-rich mesotrophic grasslands,
and so raise their conservation value.
Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (doi:) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users. |
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Keywords: | Cynosurus – Centaurea Coleoptera Grassland restoration Hay meadow Resistance Successional trajectories |
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