The response of sward-dwelling arthropod communities to reduced grassland management intensity in pastures

The response of sward-dwelling arthropod communities to reduced grassland management intensity in pastures

Blog Article

We compared arthropod taxon richness, diversity and community structure of two replicated grassland husbandry experiments to investigate effects of reduced management intensity, as measured by nutrient input levels (390, 224 and 0 kg/ha per year N in one experiment, and 225 and 88 kg/ha per year overlay set N in another).Suction sampling was used to collect Araneae, Coleoptera, Butter Dish Lid Hemiptera and Hymenoptera, with Araneae and Coleoptera also sampled with pitfall trapping.Univariate analyses found no significant differences in abundance and species density between treatments.

However, with multivariate analysis, there were significant differences in arthropod community structure between treatments in both experiments.