Ecological and economic benefits of low‐intensity urban lawn management
Ecological and economic benefits of low‐intensity urban lawn management
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城市草坪低强度管理的生态效益和经济效益
DOI：
10.1111/1365-2664.13542
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发表时间：
2020
影响因子：
5.7
通讯作者：
R. Proulx
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
C. Watson;Léonie Carignan‐Guillemette;Carole Turcotte;V. Maire;R. Proulx
城市草坪的集约化管理在全球范围内普遍存在，主要是出于美学原因。然而，越来越多的知识表明这种做法对生态和环境产生了负面影响。我们对2004年至2019年的北美和欧洲研究进行了Meta分析，其中包括来自加拿大东部的三个先前未发表的数据集，调查割草强度如何影响城市草坪的生态。Meta分析提供了综合证据，表明城市草坪中的无脊椎动物和植物多样性较低在增加割草强度下。这种下降是独立的割草“治疗”和“控制”之间的对比度（如高度或频率割草），这在研究之间有很大的不同。密集割草也会增加害虫种类（如食草甲虫幼虫和致敏植物）的发生，尽管这一组的研究仅限于北方环境。生态系统层面变量的变化（土壤温度、土壤水分亏缺和碳亏缺）不太明显，表明非生物过程的变化可能需要更长时间才能显现出来。表明节省36%的成本通过适度减少割草频率，可能是可能的。合成和应用。增加城市生物多样性和减少温室气体排放是降低草坪管理强度的强动力。我们还建议，减少害虫种类，同时节省草坪管理成本的好处可能会提供额外的社会和经济激励决策者审查城市绿地管理实践。
Intensive management of urban lawns is globally widespread, predominantly for aesthetic reasons. However, a growing body of knowledge demonstrates negative ecological and environmental effects of this practice.We present a meta‐analysis of North American and European studies from 2004 to 2019, which incorporates three previously unpublished datasets from eastern Canada, to investigate how mowing intensity impacts the ecology of urban lawns.The meta‐analysis provides aggregated evidence that invertebrate and plant diversity is lower in urban lawns under increased mowing intensity. This decline is independent of the level of contrast between mowing ‘treatment’ and ‘control’ (e.g. height or frequency of mowing), which differed considerably between studies. Intensive mowing also increases the occurrence of pest species (e.g. herbivorous beetle larvae and allergenic plants), though studies in this group were limited to northern environments. Changes in ecosystem‐level variables (soil temperature, soil moisture deficit and carbon deficit) were less evident and suggest changes in abiotic processes may take longer to become apparent.An economic case study of the mowing costs in Trois‐Rivières, Canada, suggests that cost savings of 36% may be possible with a modest reduction of mowing frequency.Synthesis and Applications.Increasing urban biodiversity and reducing greenhouse gas emissions are strong motivators for reducing lawn management intensity. We also suggest that the benefits of reducing pest species while saving lawn management costs may provide additional social and economic incentives for decision makers to review urban greenspace management practices.