DIVERSIFIED CROPPING SYSTEMS FOR BIODIVERSITY AND ECOSYSTEM SERVICES

Habitat loss and fragmentation are the largest causes of biodiversity loss and resulting declines in ecosystem services, including in agroecosystems. Global conservation of biodiversity and ecosystem services will require regenerative agricultural solutions in cropland that also maintain yields. This challenge is identified as a Program Priority Area for Sustainable Agroecosystems, and it demands new data-supported approaches that deliver the highest biodiversity and ecosystem services gain while having the lowest loss in agricultural production. One such approach is to plant areas within farms that are consistently low yielding; these areas constitute 23 million acres of cropland in the US Midwest, to native perennial vegetation.Academic labs, a state agency, and sharecroppers will collaborate to plant areas that are now croplands to native perennial plants and to assess the consequences of that conservation. To accomplish these objectives, the group will identify areas within corn-soy fields that are consistently under-yielding. Experimental treatments will include so-called "prairie strips" running through the middle of croplands that will be compared to strips at the field border; strips that will be compared in areas with different underlying soil qualities (consistently low yielding vs. not); and strips compared to non-linear shapes that are consistently low yielding. These treatments will be coproduced with stakeholders in a series of roundtable discussions. Treatments will allow tests of basic tenants of landscape ecology: how habitat configuration, underlying soil, and proximity to other habitats impacts biodiversity (including pollinating insects, microbes, and nematodes) and ecosystem services (including soil health and pollination.