Agricultural spider decline: long-term trends under constant management conditions

There is widespread evidence for a worldwide trend of insect decline, but we have much fewer data about recent temporal trends in other arthropod groups, including spiders. Spiders can be hypothesised to similarly decline because of trophic dependence on insects and being equally sensitive to local...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Scientific reports 2023-02, Vol.13 (1), p.2305-9, Article 2305
Main Authors: Samu, F., Szita, É., Botos, E., Simon, J., Gallé-Szpisjak, N., Gallé, R.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
631/158/1745
631/158/2165
631/158/853
631/601
Abundance
Agricultural land
Agriculture
Alfalfa
Animals
Arthropods
Biodiversity
Climate change
Community composition
Ecosystem
Environmental changes
Humanities and Social Sciences
Insecta
Insects
multidisciplinary
Population decline
Population studies
Science
Science (multidisciplinary)
Species richness
Spiders
Trends
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Summary:There is widespread evidence for a worldwide trend of insect decline, but we have much fewer data about recent temporal trends in other arthropod groups, including spiders. Spiders can be hypothesised to similarly decline because of trophic dependence on insects and being equally sensitive to local and global environmental changes. Background trends in arthropod populations can be verified if we decouple large-scale environmental transitions, such as climate change, from local factors. To provide a case study on baseline spider community trends, we observed changes in the spider community of an unsprayed alfalfa field and its margin 23 years apart under largely unchanged local conditions. We aimed to determine whether there are changes in spider abundance, species richness and mean species characteristics. Spider abundance per unit effort decreased dramatically, by 45% in alfalfa and by 59% in the margin, but species richness and most characteristics remained unchanged. Community composition in both habitats shifted and became more similar by the current study period. The population decline was especially marked in certain farmland species. We propose that in the absence of local causative factors, spider abundance decline in our study indicates a reduction of spider populations at landscape and regional scales.
ISSN:2045-2322
2045-2322
DOI:10.1038/s41598-023-29003-2