Agripop Friday talks

Friday's Agripop Talk

14 June 2013 - 11:00 - 12:00 Salle Seminaire

Relations plantes-criquets en milieu agricole: 
étude du lien entre l’abondance des criquets et les traits fonctionnels des plantes

Gaëtane Le Provost

Centre d’Etudes Biologiques de Chizé & Université Paris Sud XI

 

Photo by Richard Seaman. Downloaded from http://richard-seaman.com/Arthropods/Russia/

Exciting times - Gaetanne, our master student (M2) has submitted her thesis this week! But now the viva is looming -- it'll be next Monday! You better get prepared ... hence Gaetanne will do a mock talk tomorrow to receive feedback. Please all of you, do come along!

 Here a summary of her thesis:

Agricultural intensification has caused a dramatic loss of perennial lands, which has resulted in strong declines of plant diversity and invertebrate populations, leading to cascade effects at many trophic levels. Understanding the mechanisms involved in the structuring of communities is crucial to understand ecosystem responses to global change. 

In this context, applying the “Holy Grail” hypothesis and the “Response-effect” framework to the study of multitrophic systems will improve our ability to understand the underlying processes implicated in the relationship between functional diversity and ecosystem functioning. By studying the link between plants and grasshoppers in agroecosystems, we want to quantify the relative effects of land use on the functional composition of grasslands and on invertebrate herbivore communities. 

Through analyses of several plant traits and their impact on grasshopper abundance, we have identified the effect of different land use components and plant functional diversity on the relationship between plants and herbivores in grasslands. This work proposes that response traits of plants to land use change the abundance of different grasshopper species. Our results confirm the existence of a functional structure in plant communities in response to land use, affecting grasshopper communities.

 Ah, no, not THIS quest for the holy grail ...:

It refers to a work by Sandra Lavorel and collegues (e.g. see here) ...

Hence, please come all - if you ask nicely you might even get some precious tips about secret spots to do nice "sorties naturalistes" in the surrounding areas ... ;-)