PARENT SESSION
Contributed Oral Session 33: Grassland and Shrubland Communities
Monday, August 8, 1:30 PM - 5:00 PM, Meeting Room 522 A, Level 5, Palais des congrès de Montréal
Grassland biodiversity in the Swiss Alps: A survey on agricultural and socio-economic impacts at different scales.
Kampmann, Dorothea*,1, 3, Herzog, Felix1, Konold, Werner2, Wildi, Otto3, 1 Agroscope, Swiss Federal Research Station for Agriculture and Agroecology, Zurich, Switzerland3 Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research, Birmensdorf, Switzerland2 Albert Ludwigs University Freiburg, Freiburg, i.Brsg., Germany
ABSTRACT- Agricultural landscapes in the European Alps provide food and fibre and also ensure a sound ecology, hazard protection, and scenic beauty. The intact ecology of grasslands, being the predominant land-use type there, however, is under threat by altered agricultural practices and increased non-agricultural demands, such as tourism or infrastructural development. Hence, we aimed at assessing the impact of regional farming systems and tourism on grassland biodiversity at a regional scale. At a local scale, we investigated the influence of land-use intensity and abiotic site conditions, among others, accessability of grassland plots for farmers. 18 municipalities were selected across the Swiss Alps according to agricultural structure and a socio-economic classification, establishing a land-use intensity gradient. On a total of 486 grasslands we mapped plants and grasshoppers. Statistical analysis was done by variance analysis, correlation and multiple regression. Our results show that regional farming systems had a strong impact on biodiversity, which was due to the immanent land-use intensity of the farming systems under investigation. Tourism had a positive influence on biodiversity, where accompanied by a high percentage of part time farmers in the region. At the local scale, high plant species richness was associated with low stocking rates and a high percentage of non-intensive grasslands as well as with higher elevation and with poor soil quality. There was a negative correlation between the accessability of plots of a municipality and the biodiversity found there. In municipalities with high touristic activity however, the comparitively high road density did not lead to a lower biodiversity in grasslands. This might be explained by a lower level of farming intensity due to alternative income sources in these regions. We conclude, that agricultural and tourism development should go hand in hand, since they both are of major importance for the agricultural landscape. Also, in regions with low tourism impact, road infrastructure development could be regarded as a tool in biodiversity management, since accessibility of grasslands is a major decision factor, leading to intensification or abandonment of a site and the resulting shift in species richness.
Key words: grasslands, grasshoppers, tourism, accessability