Birds provide important ecosystem services in many ecosystems, including important pest control effects on productive systems. The typically low bird diversity observed in intensive agricultural landscapes renders them more susceptible to pests that cause important economic losses. Although these pests have traditionally been controlled using chemical methods, recent work suggests that bird-mediated biological control is an effective and environmentally friendly form of ecological intensification practice. We conducted a global meta-analysis to synthesize the effect of the exclusion of wild birds on crop damage, pest abundance, and crop yield in agroecosystems. We used 179 case studies from 55 articles, from which we found that wild birds reduced crop damage and pest abundance, but increased crop yield. The positive effect of birds as biological control agents was found to be significant on conventional farms using traditional chemical methods but not on organic farms. Our analysis shows that embracing ecological intensification practices such as using wild bird species as pest control represents a win–win strategy for agriculture and biodiversity.

鸟类在许多生态系统中提供重要的生态系统服务，包括对生产系统的重要害虫控制作用。在集约化农业景观中观察到的鸟类多样性通常较低，这使它们更容易受到造成重大经济损失的害虫的影响。尽管传统上使用化学方法控制这些害虫，但最近的工作表明，鸟类介导的生物控制是一种有效且环保的生态强化实践形式。我们进行了一项全球荟萃分析，以综合排除野生鸟类对农业生态系统中作物损害、害虫数量和作物产量的影响。我们使用了 55 篇文章中的 179 个案例研究，从中我们发现野生鸟类减少了作物损害和害虫数量，但增加了作物产量。发现鸟类作为生物防治剂的积极作用对使用传统化学方法的传统农场很重要，但对有机农场则不然。我们的分析表明，采用生态集约化做法（例如使用野生鸟类作为害虫控制）代表了农业和生物多样性的双赢战略。