Insect pollinators that have survived the impacts of agricultural intensification may have a greater ability to resist future environmental changes than previously thought, a new study has found.
Insect pollinators that have survived the impacts of agricultural intensification may have a greater ability to resist future environmental changes than previously thought, a new study has found.
Pollination by insects, particularly bees, is vital to food production and humans because it affects the yield or quality of 75% of globally important crop types, but in recent years there has been increasing concern about the long-term stability of this service due to widespread declines in some species.
Despite the negative impacts of agricultural intensification on plants and insect pollinators, researchers at Centre for Ecology & Hydrology and the University of Reading found the species that remain in parts of the UK with a higher proportion of farmed land are more likely to survive a variety of potential environmental changes.
However, the research, published in the Ecology Letters journal, suggested that was because these landscapes have already lost their most vulnerable species, retaining those insect and plant species that are more able to take whatever is thrown at them.
Read more at Centre for Ecology & Hydrology
Image: A red-tailed bumblebee feeds on a thistle flower. This species feeds on many different wildflower plants, making it less susceptible to the loss of individual plant species. (Credit: John Redhead)
