Differences in habitat quality and biodiversity in European grasslands, meadows and farmland: Reviewing the effects of grassland management on arthropod communities

Eising, Kasper (2019) Differences in habitat quality and biodiversity in European grasslands, meadows and farmland: Reviewing the effects of grassland management on arthropod communities. Master's Thesis / Essay, Ecology and Evolution.

	Text MSc Thesis(Final version).docx Download (2MB)
	Text Copy of Metaanalyse artikelen.xlsx Download (97kB)
	Text toestemming.pdf Restricted to Registered users only Download (201kB)

Abstract

European grasslands have undergone major changes in recent history. The development of more efficient and productive agricultural practices has intensified land-use and caused changes in the environment. These changes and the effects of climate change have caused plant communities to lose biodiversity as plants with high productivity are enabled to outcompete other species. In this review an overview of the effects that this biodiversity shift have on arthropods is presented. Additionally a meta-analysis was conducted to provide an oversight of studies recording arthropod diversity in grasslands and the differences in diversity between areas of intensive and extensive land-use. This analysis is interpreted as confirming the positive effects of extensive land use on arthropod abundance. Arthropod richness could not be positively associated to extensive land-use. In light of these results information and theories from articles and papers addressing arthropod diversity and how land use influences the arthropod community is presented. These include the effects of plant diversity, host services of plants, vegetation structure and architecture, vegetation succession and genetic variety of plants on arthropod diversity. Finally I discuss the effect of data analysis and processing of the reviewed papers, differences in methodology and sampling in these studies and analyse the value of using land-use type as an indicator for biodiversity differences.

Item Type:	Thesis (Master's Thesis / Essay)
Supervisor name:	Verkuil, Y.I.
Degree programme:	Ecology and Evolution
Thesis type:	Master's Thesis / Essay
Language:	English
Date Deposited:	02 Jul 2019
Last Modified:	04 Jul 2019 09:38
URI:	https://fse.studenttheses.ub.rug.nl/id/eprint/19813

Actions (login required)

View Item