Effects of uncultivated corridors on arthropod abundances and crop yields in soybean agroecosystems

Differences in arthropod populations and crop yields between soybean monocultures with either corridors planted to grasses (grassy), corridors allowed to enter secondary succession (successional), no corridors without an insecticide treatment (controls), or no corridors and treated with Carbaryl (insecticide) were examined. The presence of corridors in soybeans suppressed populations of leaf and stem sucking pests, particularly Empoasca fabae Harris, but not defoliators which were often more abundant in plots with corridors than in the controls. Predaceous arthropods were more abundant in successional than grassy corridors, and more numerous in plots with either type of corridor than in plots without corridors from late August until mid-September. Despite these differences among treatments in arthropod abundances, soybean yields per meter of crop row did not differ significantly between controls and any other treatment. However, because of the multiple benefits of landscape corridors identified by this and other studies, uncultivated corridors should be established within croplands for integrated management purposes.