How the common vole copes with modern farming: Insights from a capture–mark–recapture experiment

• Common vole survival varied with season, with higher survival rates in winter.
• High transition rates from barley to meadows followed barley harvesting.
• Numbers of common voles having survived ploughing in meadows were low.

In this study, using capture–mark–recapture (CMR), a common vole population was monitored for one year in an experimental study site dominated by meadows, in which field management followed a gradient of intensiveness. The aim was to estimate the demographic response to agricultural practices of the common vole. During the spring, the numbers captured were highest in the most intensively managed plots. After cereal harvesting, they were higher in meadows with the highest nitrogen input. No difference in survival was found among treatments. However, the pattern of transitions suggested that high mobility explained this result. Also, mechanical interventions like ploughing appeared to have powerful consequences for common vole survival. These results underline the critical role of dispersal and refuge habitats in the maintenance of populations of voles in agroecosystems.