Title

Native Mediterranean plants as potential food sources for natural enemies of insect pests in olive groves

Authors

Anabela Nave*^a, António L. Crespí^a, Fátima Gonçalves^a, Mercedes Campos^b, Laura Torres^a

• ^a Centre for the Research and Technology of Agro-Environmental and Biological Sciences, University of Trás-os-Montes and Alto Douro, Quinta de Prados, 5001-801, Vila Real, Portugal
• ^b Department of Environmental Protection, Experimental Station Zaidín, Profesor Albareda nº1, 18008 - Granada, Spain

^* Corresponding author: ana.nave@hotmail.com
Phone: +351 259 350 475
Fax: +351 259 350 629

Abstract

The diversity of native non-crop (“weed”) vegetation in agricultural landscapes can provide arthropod natural enemies with food sources and shelter, thus improving natural pest control and reducing dependence on chemical pesticides. Moreover, native plants to a region are uniquely positioned to provide cultural ecosystem services such as wild food and wild medicinal plants, as well as aesthetics values. The Mediterranean Basin is one of the world’s richest places in terms of plant diversity. Olive cultivation is the basic tree cultivation in the Mediterranean and dominates its rural landscape. The olive grove ecosystem, whose flora presents a notable resemblance to the flora of Mediterranean type ecosystems, is home to a myriad of species of insects, spiders and other arthropods. This includes over one hundred phytophagous species, plus an uncounted number of entomophagous that help to reduce phytophagous populations. Here we present data on flowering plant species from the ground cover of olive groves, store information on characteristics of plant species namely physiognomic type and flowering period, geographic information and some statistical values on olive groves study area and records in the flora of visitor arthropods and cultural ecosystem services. The data include information on 36 olive groves, 100 flora species (taxa), of which 86 native in Portugal, 5 endemic to Iberian Peninsula and 4 endemic to Portugal Continental, and present also a summary of the records of visitor arthropods in these flora (i.e. 2 classes, 6 orders and 12 families).

Keywords

• Aesthetic value
• Ecosystem services
• Endemic plants
• Nectar
• Parasitoid
• Pollen
• Predator
• Shelter
• Wild edible plants
• Wild medicinal plants

Introduction

The agricultural intensification, with associated reduction and fragmentation of non-crop habitats, intensive use of pesticides and high levels of disturbance, has greatly simplified farming landscapes, resulting in a sharp decline in on-farm biodiversity (Wade et al., 2008; Lu et al., 2014). A key aspect of this decline is the negative impact in the survival of beneficial arthropods and the supply of arthropod-mediated ecosystem services within crop fields. To provide these critical services beneficial arthropods depend on a variety of plant resources in their environment including shelter and overwintering sites, alternative hosts or prey and nectar and pollen (Landis et al., 2000; Jonsson et al., 2008; Lundgren, 2009). Understanding the value of native plants to a region in terms of the provision of ecosystem services, presents opportunities for their maintenance and/or reincorporation into agricultural landscapes (Landis et al., 2012). Services provided by these plants include besides enhancing natural pest control, conservation of biodiversity, soil and water conservation, and weed suppression. Moreover, in many cultures, native plants have important medicinal, religious and aesthetic values (Fiedler et al., 2008; Landis et al., 2012).

The Mediterranean Basin is one of the world’s richest places in terms of plant diversity. Thus, about 25,000 species are native to the region, and more than half of these (i.e. 13,000) are endemic, which means that they are not found anywhere else on earth (Cuttelod et al., 2008). The Portugal flora, includes a total of 3995 taxa (including infraspecific taxa), distributed among 1066 genera and 185 families, being referenced 135 endemic species (Menezes de Sequeira et al., 2012).

Several conditions, reviewed in Vogiatzakis et al. (2006), has proved particularly advantageous for the development of this high biodiversity. These are, namely: (i) the location of the basin that allowed floral and faunal elements to merge at the junction of three continents; (ii) the relative climatic uniformity throughout the region, with a summer drought and winter rainfall and (iii) the elevated temperatures during the summer drought and the accumulation of dry biomass which accelerates nutrient recycling.

Due to the above exposed, the Mediterranean Basin should be considered as a hyper-hot candidate for conservation support (Myers et al., 2000).

The olive tree (Olea europaea L. ssp. sativa Hoffman & Link) represents along with grapevine and cereal growing, the most traditional agricultural activity of the Mediterranean world and the most outstanding characteristic of their agricultural landscape (Angles, 1999). In addition to their unquestionable cultural and landscape values, traditionally managed olive groves have a major environmental importance since that often support a rich ground flora which may include species of considerable conservation interest (Perrino et al., 2014). Olive groves are, according to Allen (2009), one of the few examples of Mediterranean “semi-natural” landscapes, where some vegetation communities could develop alongside cultivation practices. Typically, the ground flora includes annuals and geophytes (bulbs) species. The annuals survive because regular shallow tilling and disturbance of the soil promotes germination of seeds; the geophytes survive because they are buried beneath the depth of tillage (Allen, 2009).

In support of the above it is noted that, as stated by Loumou and Giourga (2003), one of the principal types of Mediterranean ecosystems is, according to phytogeographers, the Oleo-Ceratonion, which, as its name suggests, is characterized by the presence of olive tree. Additionally, it is believed that through the process of ecological succession, the abandoned olive groves tend to turn into natural forests of the Mediterranean type, depending on the climatic and territorial conditions of each region (reference in Loumou and Giourga, 2003).

The occurrence, in the ground flora of traditionally managed olive groves, of a significant number of diverse plants of the Mediterranean flora (references in Loumou and Giourga, 2003) promotes the conditions for the existence of a lot of habitats for invertebrates. As a result it has a wealth of arthropod fauna that in addition to one hundred or so phytophagous species includes a large complex of entomophagous that help to reduce pest numbers (Viggiani, 1986). Although the most numerous entomophagous of this fauna are Hymenoptera parasitoids, of which a large number of species have now been recorded (e.g. Villa et al., 2016; Nave et al., in press), other groups are common, such as Tachinidae (Tschorsnig et al., 2011) also in the parasitoids, and Araneae, Anthocoridae, Chrysopidae, Coccinellidae, Formicidae and Syrphidae (e.g. Santos et al., 2009; Pascual et al., 2010; Paredes et al., 2013; Pinheiro et al., 2013a; b; 2015; Gonzalez et al., 2016), in the predators.

However and although the potential role of non-crop (“weed”) vegetation between olive trees in the conservation and augmentation of natural enemies of olive pests has long been recognized (e.g. Jervis et al., 1992), to date few data have been published identifying the native Mediterranean plant species that could potentially provide food and/or shelter resources to these beneficials (Fig. 1).

This study aimed to: a) identify the species of spontaneous flora present in the natural ground cover of traditional olive groves in Portugal; b) characterize the identified species in terms of family, physiognomic type and flowering period; c) summarize, on the basis of the available literature, the records of visitor arthropods in the identified plant species (in order to evaluate their potential in improving pest control services), as well as their interest from the standpoint of either ethnobotanical uses or aesthetic value (i.e. provision of cultural ecosystem services).

The provided information could be useful in promoting the maintenance and/or reincorporation of the studied plants into the olive grove ecosystem or even into other Mediterranean agroecosystems. So, while the role of these plants in improving pest management may be attractive to growers, the provision of cultural ecosystem services such as the wild food, wild medicines and aesthetic values, may make it far more likely that society at large will support their implementation.

Fig. 1 – Trophic interactions in the olive grove ecosystem.

GEOGRAPHIC COVERAGE

Portugal - districts of Castelo Branco (39°48' N and 7°30' W),
Guarda (40°32' N and 7°15' W), and Viseu (40°39' N and 7°54' W).

TEMPORAL COVERAGE

October and November of 2008

TAXONOMIC COVERAGE

Flora

The data include 80 genera and 100 species (see FPS.txt for detail).

Arthropods

Summary of the records of visitor arthropods in the flora based on references in available literature. The data include 2 classes, 6 orders and 12 families (see PSIF.txt for detail).

METHODS

Study area

Floristic inventories were done in 36 olive groves, with the soil covered with natural vegetation, in order to identify the plant species presents. The distribution of the olive groves by district (Fig. 2) was as follows: a) Guarda, 29 groves distributed by counties of Mêda, Guarda, Gouveia, Seia, Trancoso, Figueira de Castelo Rodrigo, Celorico da Beira and Pinhel, b) Castelo Branco, five groves distributed by counties of Belmonte, Covilhã and Fundão and c) Viseu, two groves, located in the county of Penedono (see OGSA.txt for detail). The olive groves were traditional plantations, rain-fed, managed with few or no chemical inputs, but with a high labour input. They have different ages (young to more than 60 years), plant spacing variable (from 5 × 3 m, to 8 × 8 m), including also scattered trees, from olive tree monovarietal to olive groves with several varieties (i.e. Galega, Cornicabra, Cobrançosa, Picual, Negrinha , Madural and Cordovil).

Fig 2 – Map of study area showing the distribution of the groves where floristic inventories were done.

Sampling methods

For the inventories, in each of the olive grove, 10 sampling units with 1 x 1m of surface were chosen according to chance (i.e. random sampling) but as representative of vegetation, dispersed throughout the entire survey area in a flexible sampling scheme. We made one flowering plants collection in each olive grove and all the plants were subject to confirmation its identification in the laboratory, based on the keys of Iberian plants (Castroviejo 1997). For each species the flowering period was recorded (Castroviejo 1997), life form was classified on the basis of the system of physiognomic types proposed by Raunkiaer (1934) and the natural occurrence and endemism registered from Flora-on (2016) (see PSC.txt for detail).

COLLECTOR DATA

Name: Anabela Nave
Affiliation: Centre for the Research and Technology of Agro-Environmental and Biological Sciences, University of Trás-os-Montes and Alto Douro
Address: Quinta de Prados, 5001-801, Vila Real, Portugal
Mail: ana.nave@hotmail.com

EXPERT SPECIES IDENTIFICATION

Name: António Luís Crespi
Affiliation: Centre for the Research and Technology of Agro-Environmental and Biological Sciences, University of Trás-os-Montes and Alto Douro
Address: Quinta de Prados, 5001-801, Vila Real, Portugal
Mail: acrespi@utad.pt

DATA FORMAT

The published data were provided in a full dataset of records.

Dataset components

Format type

The data tables are prepared as comma delimited text files.

Data table descriptions

ACCESSIBILITY

License and Usage Rights

This dataset is provided under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license (CC-BY 4.0) (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode).

All published data can be used freely with reference to the data paper. In no event shall the authors or the data set owners be liable for any loss of profits or for any indirect, incidental, or consequential damages arising from the use of the data set.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

This study was supported by FEDER Funds throughout Programa Operacional Factores de Competitividade - COMPETE and National Funds throughout FCT - Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia, within project PTDC/AGR-AAM/100979/2008 – “Increasing functional biodiversity in olive groves to enhance conservation biological control of insect pests”, as well as PhD grant, SFRH/BD/34394/2008 attributed to the first author. This manuscript is part of A. Nave´s Ph.D. dissertation. The authors are grateful to the olive grove owners who permitted access to the groves for this study, with support to Associação de Agricultores para Produção Integrada de Frutos de Montanha.

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