The aim of this Defra funded project was to assess the outcomes for a range of wildlife of imposing three different intensities of intervention within a typical intensive arable farm. This was a key project for understanding the scale of biodiversity benefits likely to be delivered by Entry Level Stewardship (ELS).
Project details
| Start date | 2005-08-01 |
|---|---|
| End date | 2011-07-01 |
Project outputs
This project produced the following outputs:
| Output | Type |
|---|---|
| Paper in IBIS | Peer-reviewed paper |
| Final report | Defra publication |
Closing statement
This is a comprehensive and unique piece of research about the scale of management needed to maintain or restore arable biodiversity in an intensive arable landscape. As such, it will be valuable for NE and other main target audiences such as Defra, the EU and stakeholder organisations like the NFU and CLA. Findings included:
- A higher proportion of field margin habitat is required to provide both winter and summer resources for wildlife. Ie diverse margin types are required on a farm scale.
- The effectiveness of the scheme could be improved by taking more area out of production, better management of the options chosen and more diverse margins on farm and landscape scale.
- Consideration should be given to rotating margins and to including early and late flowering species in the seed mixtures.