title: Natural enemy-mediated indirect interactions among prey species: potential for enhancing biocontrol services in agroecosystems.
abstract: Understanding how arthropod pests and their natural enemies interact in complex agroecosystems is essential for pest management programmes. Theory predicts that prey sharing a predator, such as a biological control agent, can indirectly reduce each other's density at equilibrium (apparent competition). From this premise, we (i) discuss the complexity of indirect interactions among pests in agroecosystems and highlight the importance of natural enemy-mediated indirect interactions other than apparent competition, (ii) outline factors that affect the nature of enemy-mediated indirect interactions in the field and (iii) identify the way to manipulate enemy-mediated interactions for biological control. We argue that there is a need to increase the link between community ecology theory and biological control to develop better agroecological methods of crop protection via conservation biological control. In conclusion, we identify (i) interventions to be chosen depending on agroecosystem characteristics and (ii) several lines of research that will improve the potential for enemy-mediated indirect interactions to be applied to biological control.
authors.affiliation: French National Institute for Agricultural Reseach (INRA), UMR1355-ISA, Sophia-Antipolis, France; InVivo AgroSolutions, Paris, France; CIRAD, UPR HortSys, Montpellier, France.
authors.forename: Anaïs
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Chailleux
authors.forename: Emily K
authors.initials: EK
authors.lastname: Mohl
authors.forename: Mickaël
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Teixeira Alves
authors.forename: Gerben J
authors.initials: GJ
authors.lastname: Messelink
authors.forename: Nicolas
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Desneux
mesh_terms: D000383:Agriculture / Q000379:methods; D000818:Animals; D001181:Arthropods / Q000502:physiology*; D017753:Ecosystem; D020387:Food Chain; D010572:Pest Control, Biological / Q000379:methods*; D011157:Population Dynamics; D011235:Predatory Behavior / Q000502:physiology*
keywords: apparent competition; conservation biological control; ecosystem services; functional biodiversity; generalist predator; pest management