Search Results (4)

Viticulture is a perennial cropping system that provides large inter-row space as a non-crop habitat for a range of different taxa. Extensive vegetation management has been shown to increase biodiversity and ecosystem service provision in vineyards. Important soil ecosystem services are decomposition, nutrient cycling, and pest regulation provided by the mesofauna (e.g., Acari and Collembola). However, studies investigating the effects of inter-row management on soil mesofauna are scarce. We studied the effect of inter-row management intensity (complete vegetation cover, alternating vegetation cover, and bare ground) and local pedoclimatic conditions on Acari and Collembola in nine Austrian vineyards. Our results showed that the clay content of the soil was the most important factor and increased the abundances of both analyzed taxa. Complete and alternating vegetation cover increased their abundance in comparison to bare ground management. Higher soil respiration slightly contributed to higher abundances of those two taxa in both years. In conclusion, besides the positive effects of the clay content in the soil, complete and alternating vegetation cover are feasible management practices for increasing soil mesofauna in vineyards. Full article

The abandonment of traditional agricultural practices and subsequent succession are major threats to many open-adapted species and species-rich ecosystems. Viticulture on steep slopes has recently suffered from strong declines due to insufficient profitability, thus increasing the area of fallow land considerably. Changing cultivation systems from vertically oriented to modern vineyard terraces offers an opportunity to maintain management economically viable and thus reduces further abandonment. Hillside parallel terraces favor mechanization, and their embankments offer large undisturbed areas that could provide valuable habitats. We investigated the effects of vineyard abandonment, different vineyard management types (vertically oriented vs. terraced), and local parameters on Orthoptera diversity in 45 study sites along the Upper Middle Rhine Valley in Germany. Our results show that woody structures and vineyard abandonment reduced Orthoptera diversity at the local and landscape scale due to decreased habitat quality, especially for open-adapted species. In contrast, open inter-rows of actively managed vineyard types supported heat-adapted Caelifera species. On terrace embankments, extensive management and taller vegetation benefited Ensifera species, while short and mulched vegetation in vertically oriented vineyards favored the dominance of one single Caelifera species. Our results highlight the significance of maintaining viticultural management on steep slopes for the preservation of both open-adapted Orthoptera species and the cultural landscape. Full article

Sustainable vineyard management in inter-rows may improve biodiversity and ecosystem service provision in landscapes with a high density of vineyards. The current work investigates the effect of three inter-row ground cover treatments (bare soil by tillage, alternating and complete vegetation cover) on carabid beetle communities and vine vitality, in relation to climatic, soil and landscape parameters. Pitfall traps were used to collect carabids in the spring and autumn of 2016 from nine Austrian vineyards, with all three ground cover treatments established in each vineyard. Additionally, grape berry samples were collected before harvest in order to determine juice quality parameters. Generalized linear mixed models revealed that complete vegetation cover, the most extensive vineyard inter-row management, decreased both carabid density and species richness. The variables hours of sunshine, vineyard cover at the landscape scale and mesofauna abundance had negative impacts on species richness. The largest differentiator of carabid communities was the sampling timepoint, and we observed clustering associated to vineyard manager, whereas ground cover treatment played no significant role. The importance of treatment on vine vitality parameters was low; however, complete vegetation cover was detrimental to vine vegetative growth and berry weight. On the basis of our results, we conclude that although community composition may be influenced by pedo-climatic conditions and landscape components, alternating vegetation cover is an option for maintaining both carabid diversity and high-quality berries in vineyards. Full article

In viticulture, detailed spatial information about actual evapotranspiration (ET_a) and vine water status within a vineyard may be of particular utility when applying site-specific, precision irrigation management. Over recent decades, extensive research has been carried out in the use of remote sensing energy balance models to estimate and monitor ET_a at the field level. However, one of the major limitations remains the coarse spatial resolution in the thermal infrared (TIR) domain. In this context, the recent advent of the Sentinel missions of the European Space Agency (ESA) has greatly improved the possibility of monitoring crop parameters and estimating ET_a at higher temporal and spatial resolutions. In order to bridge the gap between the coarse-resolution Sentinel-3 thermal and the fine-resolution Sentinel-2 shortwave data, sharpening techniques have been used to downscale the Sentinel-3 land surface temperature (LST) from 1 km to 20 m. However, the accurate estimates of high-resolution LST through sharpening techniques are still unclear, particularly when intended to be used for detecting crop water stress. The goal of this study was to assess the feasibility of the two-source energy balance model (TSEB) using sharpened LST images from Sentinel-2 and Sentinel-3 (TSEB-PT_S2+3) to estimate the spatio-temporal variability of actual transpiration (T) and water stress in a vineyard. T and crop water stress index (CWSI) estimates were evaluated against a vine water consumption model and regressed with in situ stem water potential (Ψ_stem). Two different TSEB approaches, using very high-resolution airborne thermal imagery, were also included in the analysis as benchmarks for TSEB-PT_S2+3. One of them uses aggregated TIR data at the vine+inter-row level (TSEB-PT_airb), while the other is based on a contextual method that directly, although separately, retrieves soil and canopy temperatures (TSEB-2T). The results obtained demonstrated that when comparing airborne T_rad and sharpened S2+3 LST, the latter tend to be underestimated. This complicates the use of TSEB-PT_S2+3 to detect crop water stress. TSEB-2T appeared to outperform all the other methods. This was shown by a higher R² and slightly lower RMSD when compared with modelled T. In addition, regressions between T and CWSI-2T with Ψ_stem also produced the highest R². Full article