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Diversity in insect responses to landscape composition drives flower visitation across semi-natural grassland plants

Hederström, Veronica LU ; Krausl, Theresia LU orcid ; Quan, Yuanyuan LU orcid ; Bates, Adam H. LU ; Blasiusson, Sandra LU ; Bygebjerg, Rune LU ; Fägerström, Christoffer LU orcid ; Kenklis, Kārlis ; Rota, Jadranka LU orcid and Sandström, Ellen LU , et al. (2025) In Agriculture, Ecosystems and Environment 383.
Abstract

Pollinators have been negatively impacted by agricultural intensification, loss of natural habitats and habitat fragmentation. This has raised concern about the persistence of plant species dependent on insect pollination in semi-natural grasslands where these are remnants of larger grazed areas, now surrounded by intensive agriculture and forests. To better understand landscape composition effects on flower visitation in grassland plant communities visited by a wide range of pollinator groups, we surveyed flowering plants and their flower visitors in 18 semi-natural grasslands in Sweden, along a gradient of proportion of arable crops in the landscape, with systematically varying proportion of permanent semi-natural grassland, forest... (More)

Pollinators have been negatively impacted by agricultural intensification, loss of natural habitats and habitat fragmentation. This has raised concern about the persistence of plant species dependent on insect pollination in semi-natural grasslands where these are remnants of larger grazed areas, now surrounded by intensive agriculture and forests. To better understand landscape composition effects on flower visitation in grassland plant communities visited by a wide range of pollinator groups, we surveyed flowering plants and their flower visitors in 18 semi-natural grasslands in Sweden, along a gradient of proportion of arable crops in the landscape, with systematically varying proportion of permanent semi-natural grassland, forest and ley. Flower visitation was dominated by bumble bees, syrphid flies and non-syrphid flies and depended on the landscape composition. Plant species for which pollinator visits were dominated by bumble bees or flies, but not solitary bees, showed more landscape-dependent flower visitation than plant species with a wider range of visitors. Higher proportion of leys was associated with lower visitation in plants visited by bumble bees and hover flies and higher proportion of permanent grassland with lower visitation in fly-visited plants. In general, a combination of visits from pollinators with contrasting responses to land-use, either at the plant species level (generalist species) or at the plant community level, reduced the sensitivity of flower visitation to the surrounding landscape. We conclude that both diversity and identity of a plant's pollinators will drive strength and direction of pollinator-mediated landscape effects on flower visitation, and likely plant reproduction.

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organization
publishing date
type
Contribution to journal
publication status
published
subject
keywords
Biodiversity, Landscape context, Landscape gradient, Pollinator decline
in
Agriculture, Ecosystems and Environment
volume
383
article number
109514
publisher
Elsevier
external identifiers
  • scopus:85216567179
ISSN
0167-8809
DOI
10.1016/j.agee.2025.109514
language
English
LU publication?
yes
additional info
Publisher Copyright: © 2025 The Authors
id
9496264e-9688-4bc7-bebe-b22492db60ef
date added to LUP
2025-02-17 08:45:41
date last changed
2025-03-03 13:44:21
@article{9496264e-9688-4bc7-bebe-b22492db60ef,
  abstract     = {{<p>Pollinators have been negatively impacted by agricultural intensification, loss of natural habitats and habitat fragmentation. This has raised concern about the persistence of plant species dependent on insect pollination in semi-natural grasslands where these are remnants of larger grazed areas, now surrounded by intensive agriculture and forests. To better understand landscape composition effects on flower visitation in grassland plant communities visited by a wide range of pollinator groups, we surveyed flowering plants and their flower visitors in 18 semi-natural grasslands in Sweden, along a gradient of proportion of arable crops in the landscape, with systematically varying proportion of permanent semi-natural grassland, forest and ley. Flower visitation was dominated by bumble bees, syrphid flies and non-syrphid flies and depended on the landscape composition. Plant species for which pollinator visits were dominated by bumble bees or flies, but not solitary bees, showed more landscape-dependent flower visitation than plant species with a wider range of visitors. Higher proportion of leys was associated with lower visitation in plants visited by bumble bees and hover flies and higher proportion of permanent grassland with lower visitation in fly-visited plants. In general, a combination of visits from pollinators with contrasting responses to land-use, either at the plant species level (generalist species) or at the plant community level, reduced the sensitivity of flower visitation to the surrounding landscape. We conclude that both diversity and identity of a plant's pollinators will drive strength and direction of pollinator-mediated landscape effects on flower visitation, and likely plant reproduction.</p>}},
  author       = {{Hederström, Veronica and Krausl, Theresia and Quan, Yuanyuan and Bates, Adam H. and Blasiusson, Sandra and Bygebjerg, Rune and Fägerström, Christoffer and Kenklis, Kārlis and Rota, Jadranka and Sandström, Ellen and Clough, Yann}},
  issn         = {{0167-8809}},
  keywords     = {{Biodiversity; Landscape context; Landscape gradient; Pollinator decline}},
  language     = {{eng}},
  month        = {{05}},
  publisher    = {{Elsevier}},
  series       = {{Agriculture, Ecosystems and Environment}},
  title        = {{Diversity in insect responses to landscape composition drives flower visitation across semi-natural grassland plants}},
  url          = {{http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.agee.2025.109514}},
  doi          = {{10.1016/j.agee.2025.109514}},
  volume       = {{383}},
  year         = {{2025}},
}