Manu E. Saunders

• BA; BEnvSc Hons; PhD
• Senior Lecturer at University of New England

Ecological interactions between crops and wild animals frequently result in increases or declines in crop yield. Yet, positive and negative interactions have mostly been treated independently, owing partly to disciplinary silos in ecological and agricultural sciences. We advocate a new integrated research paradigm that explicitly recognizes cost-be...

Current research, management and outreach programmes relevant to insect pollinator conservation are strongly focused on relationships between pollinators and insect‐pollinated crops and wild plants. Pollinators also visit wind‐pollinated plants to collect pollen, or for nest sites and materials, but these interactions are largely overlooked. I revi...

Biodiversity influences ecosystem function, but there is limited understanding of the mechanisms that support this relationship across different land use types in mosaic agroecosystems. Network approaches can help to understand how community structure influences ecosystem function across landscapes; however, in ecology, network analyses have largel...

Recent studies showing temporal changes in local and regional insect populations received exaggerated global media coverage. Confusing and inaccurate science communication on this important issue could have counterproductive effects on public support for insect conservation. The insect apocalypse narrative is fuelled by a limited number of studies...

The term ‘ecosystem disservices’ is used to refer to ecological costs that humans experience from nature. Managing ecosystems to protect ecosystem function and minimize costs to human well‐being is a global imperative. Like ecosystem services, disservices are outcomes of ecological processes and interactions. They are supplied concurrently with eco...

Communicating results and ideas to a wider audience has been an important, but challenging component of scientists working in an academic environment. Particularly in recent decades, various social media platforms have become increasingly important to facilitate this. In addition, many scientists have used blogging platforms to communicate and disc...

Lack of ecological knowledge is a major challenge for effective conservation of threatened plant species in Australia as disturbance events, such as wildfire, increase in frequency and magnitude. Rapid on‐ground surveys are increasingly important to inform recovery strategies for rare and threatened plants in response to extreme wildfire events, ye...

Urban expansion across the globe profoundly impacts local biodiversity. The growing body of urban ecology research on animals has largely focused on mammals and birds, whereas knowledge of insect ecology and conservation in urban areas remains limited. To anchor this Special Issue (SI), we have taken a broad approach to editorial and conducted a st...

Urban planning which enhances native biodiversity in and around cities is needed to address the impacts of urbanisation and conserve urban biodiversity. The “Biodiversity Sensitive Urban Design” (BSUD) framework incorporates ecological knowledge into urban planning to achieve positive biodiversity outcomes through improved urban design and infrastr...

A majority of the world's flowering plants benefit from insect pollination. Bees in particular are known to carry large amounts of pollen, and the pollen load transported is often highly conspecific. However, there is limited knowledge about the transfer of pollen by other non‐bee flower‐visiting insect taxa. We observed and collected insects visit...

Protective covers are commonly employed in agricultural systems to reduce the impacts of extreme weather events, pest species and to control the environmental conditions in which crop plants are grown. As protected cropping systems are expanding rapidly, there is an urgent need to better understand how variations in netting practices might impact p...

Insects are important pollinators of global food crops and wild plants. The adult and larval diet and habitat needs are well known for many bee taxa, but poorly understood for other pollinating taxa. Non‐bee pollinators often feed on different substrates in their larval and adult life stages, and this diet and habitat diversity has important implic...

Globally, plants display enormous variation in life‐history strategies and trait combinations. However, evidence suggests that evolutionary and physiological constraints limit the number of plant ecological strategies. Although there have been recent advances in understanding correlations among plant traits, reproductive traits are rarely considere...

Since 1970, there has been an overall decline in wildlife populations in the order of 52%. Freshwater species populations have declined by 76%; species populations in Central and South America have declined by 83%; and in the Indo-Pacific by 67%. These are often not complete extinctions, but large declines in the numbers of animals in each species,...

Aim Understanding how climate conditions influence plant–pollinator interactions at the global scale is crucial to understand how pollinator communities and ecosystem function respond to environmental change. Here, we investigate whether climate drives differences in network roles of the main insect pollinator orders: Diptera, Coleoptera, Lepidopte...

Almond is one of the world's most economically valuable crops and many varieties require cross pollination for optimal fruit set. For this reason, western honey bee (Apis mellifera L.) hives are often placed in almond orchards. However, little is known about the usage of almond and other pollen sources by individual hives during almond bloom. Here,...

Flower visitors use different parts of the landscape through the plants they visit, however these connections vary within and among land uses. Identifying which flower‐visiting insects are carrying pollen, and from where in the landscape, can elucidate key pollen–insect interactions and identify the most important sites for maintaining community‐le...

Understanding broad trends in the distribution and composition of wetlands is essential for making evidence-based management decisions. Determining temporal change in the extent of inundation in wetlands using remote sensing remains challenging and requires on-ground verification to determine accuracy and precision. Therefore, optimization and vali...

Plant life-history strategies are constrained by cost-benefit trade-offs that determine plant form and function. However, despite recent advances in the understanding of trade-offs for vegetative and physiological traits, little is known about plant reproductive economics and how they constrain plant life-history strategies and shape interactions w...

Protective covers (i.e., glasshouses, netting enclosures, and polytunnels) are increasingly used in crop production to enhance crop quality, yield, and production efficiency. However, many protected crops require insect polli-nators to achieve optimal pollination and there is no consensus about how best to manage pollinators and crop pollination in...

The role of insects as pollinators within plant communities is well established, yet our knowledge of insect biodiversity in many habitats is lacking. Given the growing concern that insect biodiversity is declining, it is increasingly important to document insect assemblages from a wide range of geographic locations and habitats. Pan trapping is a...

Here, we respond to a forum piece claiming the use of "passive" traps (e.g. pan and vane traps) leads to "flawed" results. We outline how poor scholarship, such as cherry-picking and misrepresenting results, led the authors to their unfounded conclusions. We state that we value constructive discussion around the issue of bee sampling protocol, par...

The European honey bee (Apis mellifera) is managed worldwide for honey production and crop pollination, and is an invasive species in many countries. Wild colonies occupy natural and human‐made cavities and are thought to impact other cavity‐using species. We reviewed documented evidence of wild A mellifera nesting sites globally via a literature r...

Impact assessment is an important and cost‐effective tool for assisting in the identification and prioritization of invasive alien species. With the number of alien and invasive alien species expected to increase, reliance on impact assessment tools for the identification of species that pose the greatest threats will continue to grow. Given the im...

• Understanding how increasing risk of frequent and severe fires affects biodiversity and ecosystem function is important for effective conservation and recovery, but large knowledge gaps exist for many taxa in many parts of the world, especially invertebrates. • After Australia's 2019–2020 catastrophic bushfire disaster, estimates of biodiversity...

Weather conditions, such as humidity, temperature, and wind speed, affect insect activity. Understanding how different taxa respond to varying environmental conditions is necessary to determine the extent to which environmental change may impact plant-pollinator networks. This is particularly important in alpine regions where taxa may be more susce...

Background Insects play a central role in the functioning of terrestrial and freshwater ecosystems and contribute to a multitude of ecosystem services in managed and unmanaged systems Even local declines of insect abundance and richness can have enormous ecological and economic consequences. Evidence-informed conservation actions are essential to p...

Environmental degradation is threatening biodiversity and ecosystem function globally. Mandating ecosystem-level protection in policy and legislative frameworks is essential to prevent biodiversity loss. Australia’s Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 is the key legislative mechanism for supporting biodiversity at the nati...

Background Insects play a central role in the functioning of terrestrial and freshwater ecosystems and contribute to a multitude of ecosystem services in managed and unmanaged systems Even local declines of insect abundance and richness can have enormous ecological and economic consequences. Evidence-informed conservation actions are essential to p...

Ecosystem services are benefits that humans derive from ecosystem processes. These arise from numerous interactions between plants, animals, and their environments. The term “nature’s services” was coined in the 1970s in response to increasing destruction of natural habitat and urban development with damaging environmental impacts. The term was ori...

Ambiguous or misleading language can affect science communication with peer and public audiences, with potentially damaging impacts on policy and public engagement. The word decline can be value‐laden and has inherent negative connotations. It is not always the most appropriate term to use for effective science communication to promote insect biodi...

Many insect species are under threat from the anthropogenic drivers of global change. There have been numerous well‐documented examples of insect population declines and extinctions in the scientific literature, but recent weaker studies making extreme claims of a global crisis have drawn widespread media coverage and brought unprecedented public a...

There is mounting concern over the conservation status and long‐term trends in insect populations. Many insect populations have been reported to be falling and many species are threatened with extinction. While this is true, the evidence does not support unqualified statements of ‘global insect decline’. Global environmental change does not affect...

Identifying native bees that have the ability to buzz pollinate is an important first step towards the commercialisation and widespread use of an environmentally-safe pollinator for Australian glasshouse crops such as tomato, capsicum and eggplant. There is great interest from the glasshouse industry in importing and managing exotic bumble bee spec...

Analysis of the world’s longest-running insect monitoring programme finds little evidence to support steep declines in biomass across the United Kingdom over the past 50 years. Moth biomass showed a net increase, but a gradual post-1982 decline was found in certain land uses and for some moth families.

In recent decades, entomologists have documented alarming declines in occurrence, taxonomic richness, and geographic range of insects around the world. Additionally, some recent studies have reported that insect abundance and biomass, often of common species, are rapidly declining, which has led some to dub the phenomenon an “Insect Apocalypse”. Re...

Many pollinator species visit multiple crops in multiple regions, yet we know little about their pollination service provisioning at local and regional scales. We investigated the floral visitors (n = 13,200), their effectiveness (n = 1718 single visits) and response to landscape composition across three crops avocado, mango and macadamia within a...

The management of arthropods in urban environments is complex. Although there are species that threaten human health and property, there are also extensive communities of beneficial species that need to be conserved. Current management of arthropod pests in cities relies heavily on the use of synthetic chemicals, which have a range of potential env...

Multifunctional landscapes provide multiple ecosystem services and are managed collaboratively to preserve biodiversity and ecosystem function and support human wellbeing. Linking ecological patterns across systems is essential to advance ecosystem services research and inform ecologically-sustainable landscape management. Network theory provides a...

Sustainable agroecosystems must be managed to support biodiversity conservation and food production, which occur at the interface of regional/national policy frameworks, and local knowledge and perspectives. This paper examines the current breadth of research examining farmer knowledge of beneficial insect activities that provide ecosystem services...

Citizen science can play an important role in school science education. Citizen science is particularly relevant to addressing current societal environmental sustainability challenges, as it engages the students directly with environmental science and gives students an understanding of the scientific process. In addition, it allows students to obse...

The popularity of science blogging has increased in recent years, but the number of academic scientists who maintain regular blogs is limited. The role and impact of science communication blogs aimed at general audiences is often discussed, but the value of science community blogs aimed at the academic community has largely been overlooked. Here, w...

Local and landscape factors interact to influence animal populations and, ultimately, crop yields in agroecosystems. Yet few studies have considered interactions and trade‐offs between these factors within a single agroecosystem. We sampled insect communities (fruit‐damaging pests and D iptera and H ymenoptera pollinator and natural enemy taxa) ass...

Context Birds active in vineyards in south-eastern Australia can reduce or enhance crop yields via their foraging activities (e.g. by consuming grapes or by preying on grape-eating species). Aims We examined the effectiveness of artificial perches in encouraging predatory birds into vineyards to scare frugivorous birds and consequently reduce the...

Agricultural intensification is a leading cause of global biodiversity loss, which can reduce the provisioning of ecosystem services in managed ecosystems. Organic farming and plant diversification are farm management schemes that may mitigate potential ecological harm by increasing species richness and boosting related ecosystem services to agroec...

Scavenging birds can provide ecosystem services to pastoralists by contributing to the breakdown of animal carcasses that can harbour and spread disease. However, these benefits have yet to be quantified in Australia. We monitored rabbit carcasses using motion-sensor cameras to identify beneficial avian scavengers across four landscape types (fores...

Diverse animal communities influence ecosystem function in agroecosystems through positive and negative plant-animal interactions. Yet, past research has largely failed to examine multiple interactions that can have opposing impacts on agricultural production in a given context. We collected data on arthropod communities and yield quality and quant...

Map of Australia showing study locations. (PDF)

Data. (XLSX)

Arthropod taxa included in each feeding trait group. (PDF)

Ecological management ranking for study orchards. (PDF)

Characteristics of study orchards. (PDF)

Birds active in apple orchards in south–eastern Australia can contribute positively (e.g., control crop pests) or negatively (e.g., crop damage) to crop yields. Our study is the first to identify net outcomes of these activities, using six apple orchards, varying in management intensity, in south–eastern Australia as a study system. We also conduct...

Supplementary methods and results

Examples of insect and bird damage to plasticine codling moth larvae (A) Insect damage—pinpricks; (B); insect damage—chew; (C) bird damage—beak mark.

Activity budgets for bird species observed in the orchards (n = 1,980 observations)

Codling moth larvae (A) and (B) Plasticine and real codling moth larvae attached to cardboard trays to be monitored by Reconyx HC500 remote motion-sensor cameras, (C) Plasticine codling moth larvae attached to apple tree branches near apple clusters, and d) real codling moth larvae attached to apple tree branches near apple clusters.

Average % of insect damaged apples per branch on open and netted branch (±95% CI), compared with insectivorous bird species richness All orchards except Orchard 6 received more insect damage on netted (bird excluded) branches (n = 120 branches). Orchards are listed 1–6 from lowest intensity management to highest intensity. (n = 120 branches).

Earwigs eating real and plasticine codling moth larvae at night

Types of apple damage a + b: bird damage, c + d: insect damage.

Bird species found in apple orchards over the entire season Feeding types categorised as: O, omnivore; H, herbivore; I, insectivore; G, granivore; and C, carnivore. Introduced species are listed in bold. Asterisks denote which species were observed in particular survey periods.

Insectivorous bird species richness in each orchard at key times of the growing season Orchards are listed 1–6 from lowest intensity management to highest intensity.

Pollination is a critical ecosystem function with high ecological and economic value. Conservation initiatives aimed at protecting diverse pollinator communities in natural and agricultural habitats are essential, but the implementation and success of such initiatives often depends on public support. Mass media play an important role in building pu...

Ongoing debate over the ecosystem services (ES) concept highlights a range of contrasting views and misconceptions. Schröter et al. (2014) summarise seven recurring arguments against the ES concept, which broadly relate to ethical concerns, translation across the science-policy interface, and how the concept's normative aims and optimistic assumpti...

Wild fauna occur in every agroecosystem and their interactions with crops can influence yields positively or negatively. Research on the impact of fauna activity on agricultural production focuses mostly on either the costs (e.g. crop damage) or benefits (e.g. pollination) of this activity, with few studies addressing cost–benefit trade-offs in the...

Ladybird beetles (Coleoptera: Coccinellidae) are predators of aphid and psyllid species and are often released or encouraged into timber plantations as natural enemies of economic pests. Some temperate coccinellid species overwinter in mass aggregations; however, little is known about coccinellid aggregations in Australia. Aggregations of Harmonia...

Homogenization of agricultural landscapes affects ecological processes and biodiversity and can affect the community composition of ecosystem service providers. These effects can have particular impact in landscapes dominated by monocultures of pollinator-dependent tree crop plantations, which create both spatial and temporal homogeneity at the lan...

Homogeneous tree crop plantations can adversely impact wild pollinator communities by limiting the temporal continuity of food and the availability of nesting sites. Identifying how structural differences between plantations and natural vegetation influence pollinator communities is necessary for ecological management of agroecosystems. Communities...

Agricultural landscape elements, such as field edges, are not always a barrier to insects but can influence their distribution and dispersal behaviour.The present study investigated spatial and temporal patterns in wild pollinator (fly, wasp and non-Apis bee) distribution across an edge between natural mallee woodland and monoculture almond plantat...

Five years of research on interrelationships between fauna use of almond plantations and native vegetation in north-western Victoria shows that almond plantations have a strong influence on fauna dynamics and in some cases may provide important habitat for threatened species.

Wild pollinators are becoming more valuable to global agriculture as the commercial honeybee industry is increasingly affected by disease and other stressors. Perennial tree crops are particularly reliant on insect pollination, and are often pollen limited. Research on how different tree crop production systems influence the richness and abundance...

Coloured pan trapping is a simple and efficient method for collecting flying insects, yet there is still discussion over the most effective bowl colour to use for particular target groups (e.g. pollinator insects). The success of particular colours can vary across bioregions and habitats. Most published pan trap studies have been conducted in the n...

Carvalhotingis visenda (Hemiptera: Tingidae) is the first biological control agent approved for release against cat’s claw creeper Macfadyena unguis-cati (Bignoniaceae) in Australia. The mass-rearing and field releases of C. visenda commenced in May 2007 and since then more than half a million individuals have been released at 72 sites in Queenslan...