Food webs at the landscape level: are we missing the wood for the trees?

景观层面的食物网：我们是否只见树木不见森林？

基本信息

批准号：
NE/K006568/1
负责人：
Jane Memmott
金额：
$ 82.44万
依托单位：
University of Bristol
依托单位国家：
英国
项目类别：
Research Grant
财政年份：
2013
资助国家：
英国
起止时间：
2013 至无数据
项目状态：
已结题

来源：
https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=NE%2FK006568%2F1
关键词：
Food webs landscape level missing

项目摘要

Many conservation organisations have initiatives for protecting plants and animals which operate at the landscape scale. For example there are currently 110 Living Landscape Initiatives (Wildlife Trusts), 40 Futurescapes (RSPB), and 8 Integrated Biodiversity Delivery Areas (Natural England), plus the Nature Improvement Areas (Defra). Food webs are very useful tool for studying communities of plants and animals and over a decade they have developed from simple descriptions of communities, to tools that can predict the results of environmental changes, such as global warming or species loss. Despite the strong move to landscape-level conservation though, food web studies are almost invariably conducted in small plots (e.g. 100 m2) in single habitats, to investigate, for example, pests and their natural enemies in a crop field, or pollinators and their nectar plants in a meadow. Our aim here is to initiate a major change in the way we study food webs by working at the scale of the landscape (defined as a mosaic of different habitats). This proposal will allow us for the first time to understand how food webs interact in real world landscapes and how the various habitats (e.g. woodlands vs heathland vs salt marsh) affect the structure of landscape food webs, and delivery of ecosystem services such as pest control and pollination. Our pilot data suggest that a mosaic of habitats is likely to be more resilient in to environmental damage than individual habitats. Similarly we predict better delivery of ecosystem services if a mixture of habitats are conserved. There is considerable opportunity for win : win scenarios here - better conservation of wildlife and better provision of pollination and pest control, the latter being critical for food security. There are five objectives in our proposal:Objective 1: Time is money in practical conservation biology, and networks which are more efficient to construct (i.e. cheaper!) are more likely to be used by conservation biologists. We will test whether food webs based on reduced sampling can still be used to identify the functionally most important species (i.e. those that support the most other species).Objective 2: We will test whether landscapes composed of multiple habitats are more resilient to species loss than landscapes composed of fewer habitats. Objective 3: Species that move between habitats are rarely considered in practical conservation, but could be critical for ecosystem resilience as they effectively "glue" the various habitats together. We will develop new mathematical tools to calculate how separate the various habitats are in a landscape, and conversely, how well they are glued together.Objective 4: If nature reserves are adjacent to farmland, there is potential for the former to provide ecosystem services to the latter via mobile pollinators and parasitoids. We will test whether pollination and pest control improve in patches of strawberry plants as the number of adjacent natural habitats increases. Objective 5: We will publish our findings in scientific journals and convey them to a wider audience, by: a) running three workshops for 90 nature reserve managers; b) working with the Bee Guardian Foundation to turn five towns in England into Bee Guardians; c) commissioning final year students to write reports for practitioners; d) running a blog; e) communicating findings to influential policy-makers. The research team has the skills and experience to conduct research which will improve landscape conservation projects significantly. Led by Memmott, the team consists of ecologists and computer scientists, museum taxonomists and conservation ecologists. The latter all have long-term interests and influence in multiple landscape conservation projects and as can be seen from the letters of support, our project will provide the information that practitioners need for evidence-based landscape conservation.

许多保护组织都有保护景观范围内的植物和动物的倡议。例如，目前有 110 个生态景观倡议（野生动物信托基金）、40 个未来景观 (RSPB) 和 8 个综合生物多样性交付区（自然英格兰），以及自然改善区 (Defra)。食物网是研究动植物群落的非常有用的工具，十多年来，它们已经从对群落的简单描述发展成为可以预测环境变化结果的工具，例如全球变暖或物种消失。尽管向景观层面保护的趋势强劲，但食物网研究几乎总是在单一栖息地的小块土地（例如 100 平方米）中进行，以调查例如农田中的害虫及其天敌，或传粉媒介及其草地上的蜜源植物。我们的目标是通过在景观尺度（定义为不同栖息地的马赛克）上进行研究，对我们研究食物网的方式发起重大改变。该提案将使我们第一次了解食物网在现实世界景观中如何相互作用，以及各种栖息地（例如林地、石南地、盐沼）如何影响景观食物网的结构，以及害虫防治等生态系统服务的提供和授粉。我们的试点数据表明，马赛克栖息地可能比单个栖息地更能抵御环境破坏。同样，我们预测，如果混合栖息地得到保护，生态系统服务的提供会更好。有相当多的双赢机会：这里有双赢的场景——更好地保护野生动物，更好地提供授粉和害虫防治，后者对于粮食安全至关重要。我们的提案有五个目标：目标 1：在实际保护生物学中时间就是金钱，构建效率更高（即更便宜！）的网络更有可能被保护生物学家使用。我们将测试基于减少采样的食物网是否仍可用于识别功能上最重要的物种（即那些支持大多数其他物种的物种）。目标 2：我们将测试由多个栖息地组成的景观是否更能抵御物种丧失比由更少的栖息地组成的景观。目标 3：在实际保护中很少考虑在栖息地之间移动的物种，但它们对于生态系统的恢复力可能至关重要，因为它们有效地将各种栖息地“粘合”在一起。我们将开发新的数学工具来计算景观中各种栖息地的分离程度，以及它们的粘合程度。目标 4：如果自然保护区毗邻农田，则前者有可能为以下地区提供生态系统服务：后者通过移动传粉者和寄生蜂传播。我们将测试随着邻近自然栖息地数量的增加，草莓植株的授粉和害虫控制是否有所改善。目标 5：我们将通过以下方式在科学期刊上发表我们的发现，并将其传达给更广泛的受众： a) 为 90 名自然保护区管理人员举办三场研讨会； b) 与蜜蜂守护者基金会合作，将英格兰的五个城镇转变为蜜蜂守护者； c) 委托最后一年的学生为从业者撰写报告； d) 运营博客； e) 将调查结果传达给有影响力的决策者。研究团队拥有进行研究的技能和经验，这将显着改善景观保护项目。该团队由梅莫特领导，由生态学家和计算机科学家、博物馆分类学家和保护生态学家组成。后者都在多个景观保护项目中拥有长期利益和影响力，从支持信中可以看出，我们的项目将为从业者提供基于证据的景观保护所需的信息。