DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.13621340
title: Predation activity data in organic, permaculture and conventional horticultural farms of Central Hungary

description: This dataset has been produced from the PhD research of Alfréd Szilágyi supervised by Csaba Centeri and Eszter Kovács Tormáné. The study compared permaculture, organic and conventional farming systems regarding their ecosystem-service provision potential and sustainability. Multiple ecological indicators were measured in the field during the field study in 2020, and the basic datasets (soil test results; photo gallery of the studied farms with soil core sample; soil resistance and moisture; decomposition; earthworms; nematodes; soil surface fauna; pollinators; agrobiodiversity and habitat types) are uploaded in Zenodo separately to provide scientific data on permaculture systems. In this way, we hope to contribute to international efforts to evaluate the performance of agroecological agriculture alternatives. These publications also serve as supplements to the PhD thesis. For the sake of further usability of the datasets short description of the used methods is described. For further information please contact the authors.
description: The predation activity was measured according to the method of the QUESSA European research project (Holland et al. 2020). Pests were modelled with two types of bait, flesh fly larvae (used for fishing, standard quality, white colour), which I stapled on 10*10 cm styrofoam sheets with a pin (10 larva per sheet), and Ephestia kuehniella-mealworm eggs (procured from Szentes-Bio Kft., it is used in greenhause production as feed for natural pests for overwintering), I glued them on 4 corners of cardboard cards with glue spray (TESA 60020-00000-02). During field research, one Styrofoam plate with the larvae was placed on the soil surface, one brown cardboard card also on the soil surface, and one green cardboard card with mealworm eggs on the leaves of the plant 30 cm above soil surface using a hand clipping tool at 6 points on the farms. The baits were exposed for 24 h, then recollected the next day. I counted the number of missing and damaged larvae on the plates during collection, while cardboard cards were photographed. Later missing eggs were measured from the photograph by estimating and averaging the percentage of each of the four corners. Predation surveys were carried out between 7-10 July and 27-30 August.
description: A summary of the PhD dissertation:

Our prevailing agricultural system violates sustainability criteria at many points and has a severe impact on natural ecosystems, as many studies and researchers have shown today. Several concepts have emerged on how to harmonize the maintenance of agroecosystems with production needs, one of them being sustainability and the more recent concept of ecosystem services. The objectives of the two concepts are very similar, as they both seek to balance the functions of agriculture and harmonize the impact of humans on the environment, but within a different conceptual framework. The common problem is how to measure, demonstrate, and communicate to society, the extent to which individual farms can meet these principles in practice. During my research, I started by analyzing this problem at the conceptual, and methodological levels but my main objective was to compare permaculture, organic and conventional farming systems along the two concepts based on empirical research. To this end, I conducted field studies in 15 small-scale, diverse horticultural farms (5-5-5 of each of the three types) in Pest and Nógrád counties in Hungary in 2020, related to soil, biodiversity or a specific ecosystem service (e.g. predation, decomposition, pollination). After the field and laboratory work, I interviewed the participating farmers in the first half of 2021, part of which was structured (to assess farming practices), while the second half was semi-structured questions to assess farmer attitudes. The data were first aggregated at farm type level and significant differences were statistically analyzed, while at the same time, the interviews were also aggregated and subjected to qualitative content analysis. I then aggregated the results along the four dimensions of sustainability and five ecosystem services and carried out a complex assessment. Finally, the data were thematically organized and subjected to principal component analysis to explore the interrelations between them.

 I found several significant differences between the farming systems, most of which supported the existence of positive ecological benefits of permaculture farming. I found that in the good governance dimension, permaculture performed best in terms of ethical farm management, while organic farming performed best in terms of professional management. In the environmental dimension, permaculture performed the best, with conventional performing the least. In the economic dimension, organic farming performed best, with permaculture performing the least. In the social dimension, organic farming performed best in terms of farmer welfare, while permaculture in terms of social innovation and participation; conventional farming underperformed both organic and permaculture. In all cases, permaculture had the highest potential for the studied ecosystem services (decomposition, global climate regulation, predation and pollination), as well as biodiversity as a characteristic of agroecosystem status. I have made several suggestions for further development of the research, emphasizing that it would be worthwhile to carry out more detailed, multi-year measurements with a larger sample size.