Species-specific prey choice of carabid beetles in European cereal fields

2017

National audience; Trophic interactions between species in agroecosystems provide key regulation ecosystem services and therefore also determine the dynamics, robustness and resilience of service provision. To achieve international goals of reducing application of pesticides without compromising key provisioning ecosystem services such as crop yield, recent research attaches importance to the biological control potential of carabid beetles. However, apart from feeding on pest species and weed seeds, carabids also consume non-pest prey (alternative prey) such as collembolans and earthworms, which can play a contradictory role in the efficacy of pest and weed control. Most carabids are descri…