Buffer strips plant community changes over a 10-year period and consequences on the effectiveness of agricultural pollution reduction

Buffer strips (BS) are an efficient and economical way to reduce the adverse environmental impacts of agricultural pratices. Most of the literature on BS deals with their capacity to retain and transform nutrients and herbicides. Non-agricultural habitats are critical for the conservation of biological diversity and ecological processes on farmland, but field boundary plant communities are affected by agrochemical drift and runoff. Few data are available on changes in the plant community of sown BS and their possible effects on buffer performance. The effect of different types of BS in reducing runoff volume, suspended solids, nutrients and herbicides from a cultivated area was assessed in a field experiment conducted in north-eastern Italy during 1998-2007. BS were created to obtain multifunctional effects: wood production, landscape improvement, reduction of non-point source pollution due to nutrient and herbicide runoff, and increased biodiversity. Plant cover and floral surveys of the BS were conducted to investigate BS plant community changes and relate them to BS performance in reducing agricultural pollution (Borin et al., 2005; Vianello et al., 2005). The qualitative results of a 10-year study are discussed