Strategies in Bird Conservation within the Context of Agricultural Intensification

Agricultural intensification involves increasing resources like seeds, labor, fertilizers, pesticides, technologies, and knowledge to boost crop or livestock yields on a given land area. This can include adopting new pesticides in large-scale farming or enhancing traditional knowledge of local farming practices.

Farmland birds have been particularly affected by agricultural intensification, namely by the degradation of habitats and reduction of resources. From fields and farms to landscapes and regions, habitat simplification, pesticides, and fertilizers proved detrimental for farmland specialists, farmland bird biomass, and overall diversity.

Various land management ideas were proposed to balance crop production with farmland bird conservation, such as wildlife farming and land sparing. Also, it has been suggested that mixed farms (e.g. integrating livestock and crop production) can work as hotspots for endangered farmland birds, especially within landscapes devoted to intensified crops.

This SI objective is to provide a comprehensive collection of articles focusing on this problem, including theoretical approaches, monitoring and modeling studies, and new ideas discussing the best practices to upsurge food production for increasing world population without disregarding the conservation of farmland birds and their important ecosystem services.

Article types and fees

This Research Topic accepts the following article types, unless otherwise specified in the Research Topic description:

• Brief Research Report
• Case Report
• Classification
• Clinical Trial
• Editorial
• FAIR² Data
• FAIR² DATA Direct Submission
• General Commentary
• Hypothesis and Theory
• ... View all formats

Articles that are accepted for publication by our external editors following rigorous peer review incur a publishing fee charged to Authors, institutions, or funders.

Article types

This Research Topic accepts the following article types, unless otherwise specified in the Research Topic description:

• Brief Research Report
• Case Report
• Classification
• Clinical Trial
• Editorial
• FAIR² Data
• FAIR² DATA Direct Submission
• General Commentary
• Hypothesis and Theory
• Methods
• Mini Review
• Opinion
• Original Research
• Perspective
• Review
• Systematic Review
• Technology and Code

Keywords: agricultural intensification, Farmland Bird Conservation, Impact of Pesticides on Birds, Habitat Degradation in Agriculture, Land Management for Wildlife Conservation, Balancing Crop Production and Bird Conservation, Ecosystem Services of Farmland Birds, Sustainable Farming Practices, Mixed Farming Benefits, Biodiversity in Farming Landscapes

Important note: All contributions to this Research Topic must be within the scope of the section and journal to which they are submitted, as defined in their mission statements. Frontiers reserves the right to guide an out-of-scope manuscript to a more suitable section or journal at any stage of peer review.