ARTIFICIAL NEST BOXES FOR KESTREL - PART OF INTEGRATED PROTECTION OF SUGAR BEET

作者：Poprach Karel; Machar Ivo^*

来源：Listy Cukrovarnicke a Reparske, 2014, 130(9-10): 309-311.

• biological control system
• economic injury level
• integrated pest management
• integrated pest control in sugar beet
• Kestrel

The European trend towards ecologization of agricultural production promotes the importance of methods of field pest biological control. The primary aim of biological pest control is to maintain a given target pest population and thus caused crops damage below the level of economic sustainability. The most significant agricultural pest in group of small mammals occurring in the climatically warm lowland regions of the Czech Republic is the common vole. Its populations reach the maximum abundance in regions with optimum conditions for sugar beet cultivation (corn and sugar beet production areas). One of the most efficient methods of common vole biological control is to enhance the nesting possibilities of its natural predators, which include predatory birds and owls. This paper presents the results of monitoring the abundance trends of local populations of the common kestrel (Falco tinnunculus) in artificial nest boxes installed in the sugar beet production area of the Central Moravian region. The presented results reveal that an active support of kestrel nesting in agricultural landscape significantly increases the predation pressure on the common vole populations in the field biotopes of beet root production area. The paper also provides a brief outline of basic principles in the best agricultural practices in biological control of the common vole using a method of installing kestrel nest boxes. The conclusion compares the authors' own results with literary sources, a confrontation which confirms that a high local abundance of the common kestrel (boosted by artificial nest boxes) may significantly slow down the gradation cycle of the common vole in the conditions of a beet production area.

• 出版日期2014-10