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Since 1978, a series of national surveys (Countryside Surveys) have been carried out by the Centre for Ecology and Hydrology (formerly the Institute of Terrestrial Ecology) to gather data on the natural environment in Great Britain. As the sampling framework for these surveys is not optimised to yield data on rarer or more specialised habitats, a survey was commissioned by the then Department of the Environment (DOE, now the Department for Environment Food & Rural Affairs, DEFRA), in the 1990s to carry out additional survey work in English landscapes which contained semi-natural habitats that were perceived to be under threat, or which represented areas of concern to the Ministry. The landscapes were: lowland heath, chalk and limestone grasslands, coasts and uplands. These landscapes were chosen from a list identified as 'key habitats' in the Countryside Stewardship Scheme, an agri-environment scheme initiated in 1991. The survey design was a series of gridded, stratified, randomly selected 1 km squares taken as representative of classes derived from environmental classifications (or spatial masks) for each of the four landscape types in England determined from a statistical land classification. This resulted in a total of 213 of these squares being surveyed in the summers of 1992 and 1993, with information being collected regarding vegetation species, land cover, landscape features and land use. Data from the survey were collected using standardised, repeatable methods, with the database now providing a valuable baseline against which future ecological changes, resulting from a range of different drivers, may be compared. Following the surveys, the data were analysed and described in a series of contract reports showing that valuable habitats were restricted in all landscapes and that the majority were within designated land. The data set provides major potential for analyses, beyond those published in the reports published in 1996, for example in relation to climate change, agri-environment policies and land management. Precise locations of the plots are restricted, largely for reasons of landowner confidentiality. However, the representative nature of the data set makes it highly valuable for evaluating the status of the associated landscapes and vegetation covered. Both land cover data and vegetation plot data were collected during the surveys in 1992 and 1993, and are available via the following DOI: https://doi.org/10.5285/7aefe6aa-0760-4b6d-9473-fad8b960abd4. The spatial masks are also available from: https://doi.org/10.5285/dc583be3-3649-4df6-b67e-b0f40b4ec895. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Farmland is a major land cover type in Europe and Africa and provides habitat for numerous species. The severe decline in farmland biodiversity of the last decades has been attributed to changes in farming practices, and organic and low-input farming are assumed to mitigate detrimental effects of agricultural intensification on biodiversity. Since the farm enterprise is the primary unit of agricultural decision making, management-related effects at the field scale need to be assessed at the farm level. Therefore, in this study, data were collected on habitat characteristics, vascular plant, earthworm, spider, and bee communities and on the corresponding agricultural management in 237 farms in 13 European and two African regions. In 15 environmental and agricultural homogeneous regions, 6-20 farms with the same farm type (e.g., arable crops, grassland, or specific permanent crops) were selected. If available, an equal number of organic and non-organic farms were randomly selected. Alternatively, farms were sampled along a gradient of management intensity. For all selected farms, the entire farmed area was mapped, which resulted in total in the mapping of 11 338 units attributed to 194 standardized habitat types, provided together with additional descriptors. On each farm, one site per available habitat type was randomly selected for species diversity investigations. Species were sampled on 2115 sites and identified to the species level by expert taxonomists. Species lists and abundance estimates are provided for each site and sampling date (one date for plants and earthworms, three dates for spiders and bees). In addition, farmers provided information about their management practices in face-to-face interviews following a standardized questionnaire. Farm management indicators for each farm are available (e.g., nitrogen input, pesticide applications, or energy input). Analyses revealed a positive effect of unproductive areas and a negative effect of intensive management on biodiversity. Communities of the four taxonomic groups strongly differed in their response to habitat characteristics, agricultural management, and regional circumstances. The data has potential for further insights into interactions of farmland biodiversity and agricultural management at site, farm, and regional scale. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]