Our research hypothesis was as in the Williams and Feest paper: This paper follows a similar pathway and similar methods to that used for Miscanthus but apply them to a different crop (willow) and comparator land-uses (floodplain grassland and deciduous plantation woodland). Williams and Feest showed that the growth of the biomass crop Miscanthus had a profound effect on in-crop biodiversity quality, which manifested itself in significant reductions of species richness, abundance and biomass compared to conventional land-uses (silage grass and mixed-use arable). Furthermore, there is little data regarding the impact on the in-crop ground-dwelling invertebrate community of converting floodplain grassland to willow SRC. The impact on invertebrate biodiversity of replacing floodplain grassland with willow SRC has not previously been assessed. In practice, willow SRC often replaces grassland and has also shown promise as a flood control measure.

suggests that willow SRC supports greater invertebrate and “weed” biodiversity than arable crops, although habitats such as grassland and woodland were not included in their study. Previous studies found greater abundance and diversity amongst ground-dwelling arthropod predators in willow SRC plots compared to arable plots.

Thirty species of ground beetle were recorded from willow SRC at three sites however, the study was limited to just a few weeks in August. Significant ( P < 0.05) increases of winged Hymenoptera and large Hemiptera in willow SRC, when compared to arable crops, have also been recorded. Species-richness and abundance of butterflies (Lepidoptera) have been found to be increased in willow SRC compared to arable controls with the difference significant ( P < 0.05), although this study was confined to the margins and headlands, which were wider in the willow SRC plots, and therefore did not account for the cropped habitat. Studies on bees in willow SRC in Europe have produced varying results with one Danish study failing due to the local scarcity of bees and a German study recording 28 species, concluding that the local landscape context is an important factor. To date, there have only been limited studies on the effect on biodiversity of willow SRC cultivation, and fewer that compared willow SRC to the conventional land-uses it would in many cases be replacing. Intensively-managed monocultures of willow short-rotation coppice (SRC) crops are one popular method of producing combustible biomass for bioenergy production. With the utilisation of biomass as an energy source considered to be among the measures necessary to tackle climate change, it becomes important to understand the impact that biomass crops might have on biodiversity. However, when in combination with other habitats, willow SRC cultivation on floodplain land may have an overall positive effect on invertebrate biodiversity quality. Compared to grassland there was a largely negative effect in both years. Compared to plantation woodland, in the first year, the effect was mostly positive, but this declined in the second year. The willow SRC transitioned from almost bare ground to young woodland during the two years of the study, which affected comparisons with alternative land uses as the habitat during the second year was very different from the habitat at the start of the study. A range of biodiversity indices was used to assess the biodiversity quality of each of the three plots, and the willow SRC was compared to each of the controls using Mann-Whitney tests. Pitfall traps were used to collect ground beetles (Carabidae) and arachnids (Araneae and Opiliones) in the plots over a period of two years. The biodiversity quality of ground-layer invertebrates within the cropped area of a plantation of the biomass crop willow short-rotation coppice (SRC) grown within a floodplain was compared to the biodiversity quality of the neighbouring plots of floodplain grassland and a mixed deciduous woodland plantation.

Willow coppice