Abstract
Abstract To address biodiversity declines within semi‐natural habitats, land management must cater for diverse taxonomic groups. Integrating our understanding of the ecological requirements of priority (rare, scarce or threatened) species through ‘biodiversity auditing’, with that of the intensity and complexity of historical land use, encourages novel forms of management. Experimental confirmation is needed to establish whether this enhances biodiversity conservation relative to routine management. Biodiversity auditing and historical land use of dry‐open terrestrial habitats in Breckland (Eastern England) both encourage management incorporating ground disturbance and spatio‐temporal variability. To test biodiversity conservation outcomes, we developed forty 4‐ha management complexes over three successive winters, of which 20 were shallow‐cultivated (rotovation) and 20 deep‐cultivated (ploughing), stratified across 3,850‐ha of closed‐sward dry grassland and lowland heathland (collectively ‘dry grassland’). Complexes comprised four 1‐ha subtreatments: repeat‐cultivation, first‐time cultivation, 1‐year‐old fallow and 2‐year‐old fallow. We examined responses of vascular plants; spiders; true bugs; ground, rove and ‘other’ beetles; bees and wasps; ants; and true flies on treatment complexes and twenty‐one 4‐ha untreated controls. Sampling gave 132,251 invertebrates from 877 species and 28,846 plant observations from 167 species. Resampling and rarefaction analyses showed shallow‐ and deep‐cultivation both doubled priority species richness (pooling subtreatments within complexes) compared to controls. Priority spider, ground beetle, other beetle and true bug richness were greater on both treatments than controls. Responses were strongest for those priority dry‐open habitat associated invertebrates initially predicted (by biodiversity auditing) to benefit from heavy physical disturbance. Assemblage composition (pooling non‐priority and priority species) varied between subtreatments for plants, ants, true bugs, spiders, ground, rove and other beetles; but only 1‐year‐old fallowed deep‐cultivation increased priority richness across multiple taxa. Treatments produced similar biodiversity responses across various dry grassland ‘habitats’ that differed in plant composition, allowing simplified management guidance. Synthesis and applications. Our landscape‐scale experiment confirmed the considerable biodiversity value of interventions inspired by history and informed by systematic multi‐taxa analysis of ecological requirements across priority biota. Since assemblage composition varied between subtreatments, providing heterogeneity in management will support the widest suite of species. Crucially, the intended recipients responded most strongly, suggesting biodiversity audits could successfully inform interventions within other systems.
Highlights
Across Europe, conservation tends to focus on semi-natural habitats shaped by a long history of human management (EC, 1992; Ratcliffe, 1977), yet priority plants (Hülber et al, 2017) and invertebrates (Seibold et al, 2019) continue to disappear from such areas
Through one of the largest multi-taxa land management experiment yet conducted in a European grassland, we quantified consequences of management interventions inspired by a priori knowledge of the intensity and complexity of historic land use, and informed by systematic, cross-taxa analysis of priority species and their ecological requirements
Within the complexes, the full subtreatment complement is needed to support the widest suite of species (1- and 2-year-old fallows, repeat and first-time cultivations), as assemblage composition varied with subtreatment
Summary
Across Europe, conservation tends to focus on semi-natural habitats shaped by a long history of human management (EC, 1992; Ratcliffe, 1977), yet priority plants (Hülber et al, 2017) and invertebrates (Seibold et al, 2019) continue to disappear from such areas. Synthesising autecological knowledge through biodiversity audits (Dolman et al, 2012) and a detailed understanding of historic land-use complexities (Fuller et al, 2017; Linnell et al, 2015) both inspire novel interventions (hereafter, ‘enhanced management’) that emphasise physical disturbance, grazing, nutrient removal, spatio-temporal variability, early successional habitats and structural complexity (Fuller et al, 2017) This might involve near-accurate replication of specific pre-industrial practices (e.g. coppicing, Merckx et al, 2012) or the use of wild or domestic herbivores to create and maintain dynamic mosaics (consistent with some principles of rewilding, Van Klink & WallisDeVries, 2018); but in other circumstances it may be appropriate to adopt new approaches that provide the resources needed by the widest range of species, priority species not helped by routine management. To test the efficacy of treatments based on autecological synthesis and historic land use, we compared responses to shallow- and deep-cultivation at the ‘complex level’ (pooling across subtreatments) examining species richness (hereafter ‘richness’) and composition
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