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Understanding trophic interactions in agroecosystems is crucial for harnessing ecosystem services such as pest control, thus enabling a reduction in pesticide use. Carabid beetles (Coleoptera: Carabidae) have the potential to regulate not only insect pests but also weed seeds and slugs. The aim of this study was to investigate the food choice of different carabid species in the experimental setting of a cereal field with varying seed and slug prey availability during the season. In addition to varying food availability, the effects of species identity and season on carabid food choice should also be closely examined. Therefore, the gut contents of 1,120 beetles of eight carabid species were screened for the DNA of plants, aphids, springtails, earthworms and slugs via diagnostic multiplex PCR and a nested metabarcoding approach for plant species identification. Plant DNA was detected far more often (72%) than the various animal prey types (less than 12.5% each). Within the plant detections, 80 weed species were identified in the metabarcoding, with Galinsoga parviflora/quadriradiata (Galinsoga spp.—quickweeds) as the most frequently detected species. Carabid food choice was driven by their species identity and seasonality, while no effect of increased availability of seeds and slugs on their food choice was detected. While weed seeds seem to be an important food source for carabids, their availability does not directly affect the carabid diet. The importance of consumer identity and seasonality highlight the need for a diverse carabid species community for resilient pest control services. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Many omnivorous arthropods act as important pest control agents in agroecosystems. Assessing their prey choices helps to better understand their biocontrol potential in different environmental settings. To this end, multi‐target approaches of molecular gut content analysis allow studying their prey choices. Yet, DNA‐based analysis of trophic interactions is challenged by the question of whether the detected food DNA was ingested primarily as direct prey, or secondarily via the gut content of a consumed animal. Experimental data are needed to understand the potential bias derived through secondary predation. Here we address this issue for a phloem‐feeding aphid consumed by omnivorous carabids. In feeding experiments, Pseudoophonus rufipes beetles were offered grain aphids Sitobion avenae as primary prey, which had fed on barley seedlings. Gut content samples of carabids collected after 0, 3, 9, 12, 24, 32 or 64 h of digestion time and whole‐body aphids were screened for the presence of aphid and plant DNA. Samples positive for plant DNA were subsequently tested with Poaceae‐specific primers. None of the 7.8% gut content samples that tested positive for general plant DNA amplified with the Poaceae primers. Moreover, none of the whole‐body extracted aphids tested positive for plant DNA, neither with general nor with family‐specific primers. We, therefore, conclude that the plant DNA detections in our experiment can be ascribed to remnants of plant material in the guts of the field‐collected carabids. Our findings demonstrate that these phloem‐feeding aphids are an unlikely cause of false trophic link assignment because no secondarily consumed plant DNA, derived either from aphid gut content or host‐plant environmental DNA on aphid bodies, could be detected in carabid gut content samples. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Carabid beetles are abundant in temperate agroecosystems and can play a pivotal role as biocontrol agents. While there is good knowledge regarding their effects on invertebrate pests in some systems, comparably little is known on the rate of seed feeding under field conditions. Molecular approaches are ideally suited for investigating carabid feeding interactions; to date, however, they have only been applied to animal prey. We sampled adult carabid beetles in organic cereal fields in three regions along a Central European transect. Regurgitates from populations of the three most common species, Poecilus cupreus, Pseudoophonus rufipes and Pterostichus melanarius, were screened for plant DNA, cereal aphids, collembolans and earthworms. The frequency of carabid individuals positive for plant DNA was high (> 70%) and independent of carabid species, sex, region and the time point of sampling. Detections for non-pest and pest prey were comparably lower, with 21.6% for collembolans, 18.1% for earthworms and 4.2% for aphids, respectively. Despite the prolonged detection period of plant DNA in carabid guts, as compared to animal prey, these first results suggest that weed seeds form an important part of the adult carabid diet. It would also lend support to the hypothesis that seed-feeding carabids are biocontrol agents of weeds, with effects of regulation on the weed seedbank that depend on behavioural and contextual factors including carabid species preferences for weed seed species, their life stage and tillage practices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]