Landscape composition affects ecosystems services, including agricultural pest management. However, relationships between land use and agricultural insects are not well understood, and many complexities remain to be explored. Here we examine whether nonagricultural landscapes can directly suppress agricultural pests, how multiple spatial scales of land use concurrently affect insect populations, and the relationships between regional land use and insect populations. We tracked densities of three specialist corn (Zea mays) pests (Ostrinia nubilalis, European corn borer; Diabrotica virgifera, western corn rootworm; Diabrotica barberi, northern corn rootworm), and two generalist predator lady beetles (Coleomegilla maculata and Propylea quatuordecimpunctata) in field corn and determined their relationships to agricultural land use at three spatial scales (field perimeter, 1‐km, and 20‐km radius areas). Pest densities were either higher (D. virgifera and D. barberi) or unchanged (O. nubilalis) in landscapes with more corn, while natural enemy densities were either lower (C. maculata) or unchanged (P. quatuordecimpunctata). Results for D. virgifera and D. barberi indicate that decreasing the area of preferred crop in the landscape can directly suppress specialist insect pests. Multiple scales of land use affected populations of D. virgifera and C. maculata, and D. virgifera populations showed strong relationships with regional, 20‐km‐scale land use. These results suggest that farm planning and government policies aimed at diversifying local and regional agricultural landscapes show promise for increasing biological control and directly suppressing agricultural pests.

Recent synthesis studies have shown inconsistent responses of crop pests to landscape composition, imposing a fundamental limit to our capacity to design sustainable crop protection strategies to reduce yield losses caused by insect pests. Using a global dataset composed of 5242 observations encompassing 48 agricultural pest species and 26 crop species, we tested the role of pest traits (exotic status, host breadth and habitat breadth) and environmental context (crop type, range in landscape gradient and climate) in modifying the pest response to increasing semi-natural habitats in the surrounding landscape. For natives, increasing semi-natural habitats decreased the abundance of pests that exploit only crop habitats or that are highly polyphagous. On the contrary, populations of exotic pests increased with an increasing cover of semi-natural habitats. These effects might be related to changes in host plants and other resources across the landscapes and/or to modified top-down control by natural enemies. The range of the landscape gradient explored and climate did not affect pests, while crop type modified the response of pests to landscape composition. Although species traits and environmental context helped in explaining some of the variability in pest response to landscape composition, the observed large interspecific differences suggest that a portfolio of strategies must be considered and implemented for the effective control of rapidly changing communities of crop pests in agroecosystems.

To slow the resistance evolution of the European corn borer (ECB) to Cry proteins expressed in transgenic Bacillus thuringensis (Bt) corn, the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has adopted an insect resistance management (IRM) plan that relies on a “high dose/refuge” strategy. However, this IRM plan does not consider possible ecological differences between the two ECB pheromone races (E and Z). Using carbon isotope analysis, we found that unstructured (non‐corn) refuges contribute more to E race (18%) than to Z race (4%) populations of ECB in upstate New York (USA). Furthermore, feeding on non‐corn hosts is associated with decreased body mass and reduced fecundity. We also show that the geographic range of E‐race ECB is restricted within the range of the Z race and that E‐race ECB are increasingly dominant in regions with increasing non‐corn habitat. While the proportion of E‐race ECB developing in unstructured refuges is higher than previously assumed, low rates of unstructured refuge use by the Z race, evidence for reduced fecundity when reared on non‐corn hosts, and complete sympatry within the E race range all argue against a relaxation of current IRM refuge standards in corn based on alternative‐host use. We also discuss implications of this research for integrated pest management in vegetables and IRM in Bt cotton.

‘No-till’ (NT) agriculture, which eliminates nearly all physical disturbance of the soil surface on croplands, has been widely promoted as a means of soil organic carbon (SOC) sequestration with the potential to mitigate climate change. Here we provide the first global estimates of the SOC sequestration potential of NT adoption using a global land surface model (LSM). We use an LSM to simulate losses of SOC due to intensive tillage (IT) over the historical time period (1850–2014), followed by future simulations (2015–2100) assessing the SOC sequestration potential of adopting NT globally. Historical losses due to simulated IT practices ranged from 6.8 to 16.8 Gt C, or roughly 5%–13% of the 133 Gt C of global cumulative SOC losses attributable to agriculture reported elsewhere. Cumulative SOC sequestration in NT simulations over the entire 21st century was equivalent to approximately one year of current fossil fuel emissions and ranged between 6.6 and 14.4 Gt C (0.08–0.17 Gt C yr⁻¹). Modeled increases in SOC sequestration under NT were concentrated in cool, humid temperate regions, with minimal SOC gains in the tropics. These results indicate that the global potential for SOC sequestration from NT adoption may be more limited than reported in some studies and promoted by policymakers. Our incorporation of tillage practices into an LSM is a major step toward integration of soil tillage as a management practice into LSMs and associated Earth system models. Future work should focus on improving process-understanding of tillage practices and their integration into LSMs, as well as resolving modeled versus observed estimates of SOC sequestration from NT adoption, particularly in the tropics.

Pollination provided by bees is a critical ecosystem service for agricultural production. However, bee populations are at risk from stressors such as habitat loss, pesticides, and disease. On-farm wildflower plantings is one mitigation strategy to provide habitat and resources for bees. In many instances, government programs can subsidize the installation of these plantings for private landowners. Semi-natural habitat (SNH) in the landscape is also important for bee conservation and may alter the effectiveness of wildflower plantings. In this study, we tested the effectiveness of wildflower plantings and interactions with SNH in the landscape for promoting bee abundance and richness. Bee surveys were conducted over 2 yr at 22 sites in eastern Virginia and Maryland. Wildflower plantings, averaging 0.22 ha in size, were installed and maintained by cooperators at 10 of the sites. In total, 5,122 bees were identified from 85 species. Wildflower plantings did not alter bee communities independently, but bee abundance was greater on farms with plantings and 20–30% SNH in the landscape. Bee abundance and richness had nonlinear responses to increasing SNH in the landscape. The positive effects for richness and abundance peaked when SNH was approximately 40% of the landscape. Similar to predictions of the intermediate-landscape complexity hypothesis, increases in bee abundance at wildflower sites were only detected in simplified landscapes. Results indicate that small wildflower plantings in the Mid-Atlantic U.S. only provided conservation benefits to bee communities under specific circumstances on the scale studied, and that conserving SNH across the landscape may be a more important strategy.