Plant–pollinator interactions in apple orchards from a production and conservation perspective
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Date
Publisher
Wiley
Abstract
In an agricultural landscape, production and conservation ideally go hand in
hand. In a win-win scenario, conservation measures, such as hedges and
flower strips, provide support for biodiversity and crop production for example
by increased pollination and pollinator diversity. However, these conservation
measures may also decrease pollination by attracting pollinators and competing
with crop flower visits. Here, we studied plant–pollinator interactions from
two different perspectives. First, we looked at the production perspective investigating
whether plant–pollinator networks differed between apple orchards
with and without adjacent flower strips and hedges. With help of the Bayes
factor, we investigated similarity and conclude that there are no differences
between pollination networks with or without adjacent flower strips and
hedges. Second, we looked at the conservation perspective and analyzed the
impact of hedges and flower strips on pollinators and their interactions with
plants before and after apple bloom in April. We showed that apple pollinators
used more flower resources in flower strips and hedges across the whole season
compared to isolated orchards. In orchards with flower strips and hedges,
interactions were more constant over time. We conclude that flower strips and
hedges are beneficial for conservation of apple pollinators without being harmful
for apple flower pollination.
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Except where otherwised noted, this item's license is described as Attribution 4.0 International