Novel grassland habitats along linear infrastructure have gained attention as potential supplementary or replacement habitats for species suffering from the widespread loss of traditionally managed semi-natural grasslands. However, it can take time for species to colonise new habitats, and both the historical and the current landscape composition can affect colonisation rates, particularly for grassland specialist species. We investigated the influence of more than 100 years of landscape history on present-day species richness of plants, butterflies and bumblebees in two types of linear infrastructure habitats: road verges and power line corridors. We analysed the effects of time since habitat establishment and the amount of surrounding grassland cover in different time periods on species richness of the three taxa. Our results suggest a long time lag in the establishment of plant species in novel grassland habitats, with richness of butterflies and bumblebees largely dependent on the richness of plant species. There was no direct relationship between habitat age and the richness of butterflies or bumblebees, but we found unexpected legacy effects of grassland area on present-day species richness. Higher richness of bumblebee species in road verges located in landscapes with larger surrounding grassland cover in the past is most likely a consequence of those landscapes containing a mosaic of afforested and abandoned grassland habitats today. Furthermore, we found that power line corridors might be important replacement habitats for butterflies in landscapes with little other grassland area left. Provided that road verges and power-line corridors are managed appropriately, our results show that their species richness can be expected to increase in the future.

中文翻译：

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新草原栖息地的物种积累与土地覆盖历史有关

线性基础设施沿线的新型草原栖息地作为遭受传统管理的半自然草原广泛丧失的物种的潜在补充或替代栖息地而受到关注。然而，物种殖民新的栖息地可能需要时间，历史和当前的景观构成都会影响殖民率，特别是对于草原特殊物种而言。我们调查了 100 多年的景观历史对两种线性基础设施栖息地（道路边缘和电线走廊）中植物、蝴蝶和熊蜂目前物种丰富度的影响。我们分析了栖息地建立以来的时间和不同时间段周围草地覆盖量对三个类群物种丰富度的影响。我们的结果表明，新的草原栖息地中植物物种的建立存在很长一段时间的滞后，蝴蝶和熊蜂的丰富度很大程度上取决于植物物种的丰富度。栖息地年龄与蝴蝶或熊蜂的丰富度之间没有直接关系，但我们发现草原面积对当今物种丰富度产生了意想不到的遗留影响。过去，位于周围草地覆盖范围较大的景观中的道路边缘熊蜂物种的丰富度很可能是由于如今这些景观包含植被茂密和废弃的草地栖息地而造成的。此外，我们发现，在其他草原区域所剩无几的景观中，电线走廊可能是蝴蝶的重要替代栖息地。