Thomas Drapela

Forschungsinstitut für biologischen Landbau - FiBL Österreich

Sustainability assessment of agri-food-systems is becoming increasingly important due to growing negative environmental, social, and economic impacts of food production. Organic agriculture is often considered to play a key role in improving the sustainability of agri-food systems. This study contrasts the results of a comprehensive sustainability...

Although urbanization is increasing worldwide, private gardens may help mitigate the impact of urbanization on butterfly diversity. We investigated how local and landscape factors correspond with the observed butterfly species diversity and species composition in Viennese private gardens. The goal is to determine the importance of private gardens f...

We modeled the impact of different production intensities for several agricultural crops within different landscape contexts to analyze potential trade-offs between agricultural production and biodiversity protection goals. The land use impact assessment method for biodiversity applied integrates cause-effect relationships between landscape structu...

Semi-natural habitats are part of agri-environment programmes throughout Europe. Little is known about activity-density and assemblage composition of carabid beetles within sown wildflower areas (SWA) compared with conventional grassy field margins and adjoining arable fields.In 10 landscapes, two pairs of winter wheat fields with adjoining SWA and...

The novel method developed for this study evaluates the impact of farming practices on farmland biodiversity, allowing for the assessment of the biodiversity potential of dairy farms at farm and product levels. We linked farming practices as pressure indicators to the species number and abundance of 11 indicator species groups (ISGs), evaluated sem...

Earthworms (Annelida: Oligochaeta) deposit several tons per hectare of casts enriched in nutrients and/or arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AMF) and create a spatial and temporal soil heterogeneity that can play a role in structuring plant communities. However, while we begin to understand the role of surface casts, it is still unclear to what extent p...

Invasion of non-native species is among the top threats for the biodiversity and functioning of native and agricultural ecosystems worldwide. We investigated whether the herbivory of the slug Arion vulgaris (formerly Arion lusitanicus; Gastropoda), that is listed among the 100 worst alien species in Europe, is affected by soil organisms commonly pr...

Background Biodiversity loss and species invasions are among the most important human-induced global changes. Moreover, these two processes are interlinked as ecosystem invasibility is considered to increase with decreasing biodiversity. In temperate grasslands, earthworms serve as important ecosystem engineers making up the majority of soil faunal...

Soil animals are rarely considered in landscape ecology although recent findings show that landscape composition and habitat fragmentation may exert a strong influence on their communities. We assessed the relationships between landscape parameters and the species richness of Collembola (springtails) in agricultural eastern Austria, hypothesizing t...

The carabid beetles Amara similata and Poecilus cupreus are abundant in Central European winter oilseed rape (OSR) fields and potential antagonists of OSR pests. Therefore, they were investigated in 29 OSR fields relative to the influence of field and landscape parameters on their nutritional condition, reproductive potential and activity density....

Both earthworms and arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AMF) are important ecosystem engineers co-occurring in temperate grasslands. However, their combined impacts during grassland establishment are poorly understood and have never been studied. We used large mesocosms to study the effects of different functional groups of earthworms (i.e., vertically b...

In this greenhouse experiment we tested whether (i) ubiquitous arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AMF) taxa (Glomus claroideum, G. geosporum, G. intraradices, G. mosseae) singly and in a mixture differently affect growth and biomass production of four co-occurring grassland species (grass: Arrhenatherum elatius, non-leguminous forbs: Plantago lanceolata...

1.Labelling plants with 15N and 13C stable isotopes usually require cultivation of plants in isotopically enriched soil and gas-tight labelling chambers - both approaches are not suitable if one aims to investigate in situ species interactions in real plant communities. 2.In this greenhouse experiment, we tested a labelling method in which dual-lab...

Earthworms (Oligochaeta: Lumbricidae) have substantial effects on the structure and fertility of soils with consequences for the diversity of plant communities and associated ecosystem functions. However, we still lack a clear understanding of the functional role earthworms play in terrestrial ecosystems, partly because easy-to-use methods to quant...

In large parts of Europe Pardosa spp. (Lycosidae) are among the most abundant wolf spiders in arable fields and potentially important natural control agents of pests. We studied the influence of landscape factors on activity density, adult body size and fecundity of P. agrestis in 29 winter oilseed rape fields (Brassica napus L.) in Eastern Austria...

The abundance of the insect pests: pollen beetle (Meligethes aeneus), stem weevils (Ceutorhynchus napi, C. pallidactylus) and brassica pod midge (Dasineura brassicae), pest damage, species richness and activity density of spiders, and density, body size and offspring of the wolf spider, Pardosa agrestis, in oilseed rape fields relative to site and...

Considerable effort has been made to investigate how landscape composition and spatial structures of habitats influence distribution patterns of species. In particular, specialist insect herbivores are known to be affected by spatial and temporal accessibility of their host plants. We studied three important insect pests of oilseed rape (OSR): Meli...

We examined the influence of crop management (crop density, nitrogen fertilization level) and landscape parameters [areal proportion of oilseed rape (OSR), Brassica napus L. var. oleifera Metzg. (Brassicaceae), and proportions, lengths and distances of various non-crop habitats] on the parasitism of stem weevils (Ceutorhynchus spp.; Coleoptera: Cur...

We investigated, (i) whether the emergence from pupation of two coleopteran pest insect groups in oilseed rape (OSR, Brassica napus L.)—pollen beetles (Meligethes spp. F., Nitidulidae) and stem weevils (Ceutorhynchus pallidactylus Marsh and C. napi Gyll., Curculionidae)—is affected by the exclusion of ground-dwelling predatory arthropods, and (ii)...

The combination of the organic matter, micro-climatic environments and plant cover belongs to important factors for the distribution of soil meso-fauna, especially Collembola. There are no studies attending to these factors on collembolan communities in reedbed vegetation. The main goals of our investigation were therefore to compare diversity of C...

Winter oilseed rape (OSR, Brassica napus) cropping is often associated with an intensive use of pesticides. The transformation of structurally rich landscapes into more monotonous landscapes may be partly responsible for this, because non-crop habitats believed to benefit natural enemies have been eliminated. We examined the influence of field (soi...

Skalenabhängiger Einfluss der Landschaft auf die Diversität epigäischer Spinnen in Winterrapsfeldern Die Intensivierung der Landwirtschaft stellt weltweit eine der bedeutendsten Bedrohungen der Biodiversität dar. Maßnahmen, die die Diversität der Landschaft erhöhen werden daher als eine zentrale Möglichkeit gesehen, den Verlust von Arten in Kulturl...

Spiders are an abundant and diverse group of generalist predators in arable fields. Knowledge on what landscape and site factors affect this group can be valuable for efforts to reduce biodiversity loss in agricultural landscapes and can have implications for natural pest control. We investigated the impact of landscape and site factors on epigeic...

It was investigated whether damage on winter oilseed rape (Brassica napus) caused by three major pests (rape and cabbage stem weevil, pollen beetle, brassica pod midge) was affected by within-field (soil quality, nitrogen fertilization level, plant development, stand density) and landscape factors (percentage B. napus area, isolation of B. napus fi...

The water spider Argyroneta aquatica (Clerck) is the only spider that spends its whole life under water. Water spiders keep an air bubble around their body for breathing and build under-water air bells, which they use for shelter and raising offspring, digesting and consuming prey, moulting, depositing eggs and sperm, and copulating. It is unclear...

Der Einfluss von Feld- und Landschaftsparameter auf die Abundanzen wichtiger Raps- schädlinge (Rapsglanzkäfer - Meligethes aeneus und M. viridescens, Nitidulidae, Coleoptera; Gefleckter Kohltriebrüssler und Großer Rapsstängelrüssler - Ceutorhynchus pallidactylus und C. napi, Curculionidae, Coleoptera; Kohlschotenmücke - Dasineura brassicae, Cecidom...

Considerable scientific effort has gone into the investigation of how landscape composition and spatial structures of habitats influence distribution patterns of species. In particular, specialist insect herbivores are known to be affected by spatial and temporal accessibility of their host plants. Here we analysed species density data of three imp...

In this greenhouse experiment we tested whether (i) ubiquitous arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AMF) taxa (Glomus claroideum, G. geosporum, G. intraradices, G. mosseae) singly and in a mixture differently affect growth and biomass production of four co-occurring grassland species (grass: Arrhenatherum elatius, non-leguminous forbs: Plantago lanceolata...