The impacts of spatial and temporal complexity across landscapes on biological control: a review

Biological control is affected by the composition of landscapes surrounding agricultural fields. Natural enemy communities are typically more diverse, and effective at providing biological control services, in complex compared to simple landscapes. However, the use of simple metrics to characterize landscapes, such as the proportion of agricultural habitat, obscures the mechanisms by which landscapes affect biological control. Studies that evaluate the overall complexity of agricultural landscapes, and their temporal variability, allow for a greater mechanistic understanding of the impacts of landscape composition on biological control. From an applied perspective, decision support systems, which deliver real-time information about pest and natural enemy populations, are an effective tool for delivering recommendations to strengthen biological control across space and time.