PARENT SESSION
Poster Session 19: Biodiversity
Wednesday, August 10, 5:00 PM - 6:30 PM, Exhibit Hall 220 A-E, Level 2, Palais des congrès de Montréal

Habitat-specific contributions to insect diversity in agricultural mosaic landscapes.

Diekötter, Tim^{1, 2}, Billeter, Regula², Crist, Thomas², ¹ Miami University, Oxford, OH, USA² Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH), Zurich, Switzerland

ABSTRACT- European agricultural landscapes are mosaics of intensively cultivated areas interspersed with semi-natural elements, such as hedgerows, brooks, or woodlots. Although these elements comprise a small fraction of the total area, they are known to provide habitat to the majority of the landscape biodiversity. Insights into the habitat-specific contributions to species diversity are needed for the conservation of biodiversity in agricultural landscapes. We investigated the diversity of wild bees and true bugs in two differently structured agricultural landscapes in Switzerland. In each landscape, we partitioned the total species richness () into its additive components within (_H) and among (_H) habitat types. In the landscape characterized by a patchy, isolated distribution of four different habitat types, among-habitat diversity (_H) explained 43.9% of the total diversity (); in the landscape with higher habitat connectivity, diversity among six habitat types (_H) comprised 52.3% of the total diversity (). To further investigate diversity patterns, the within-habitat diversity (_H) was subdivided into within- (_P) and among-patch (_P) diversity. Diversity partitions in the landscape with a patchy, isolated distribution of habitats were characterized by similarly low values of within-patch diversity (_P = 17.2 - 25.5%) across habitat types. Consequently, differences in habitat specific contributions (_H) to landscape diversity () were largely due to differences in among-patch diversity (_P). Within-patch diversity (_P) in the landscape with higher habitat connectivity was generally higher and differed among habitat types (_P = 21.5 - 38.2%). Higher levels of among-patch (_P) diversity for some habitats may be related to the connectivity of patches. Differences in the habitat-specific diversity and the diversity partitions in the two landscapes indicate the need for flexible conservation strategies. Conserving habitat-specific diversity may require more patches for habitats with low within-patch diversity (_P) than for equally diverse habitats with higher within-patch diversity (_P).

Key words: additive partitioning, Apidae, conservation, Heteroptera