Associations between plant and pollinator communities under grassland restoration respond mainly to landscape connectivity

1. Land use change can disrupt associations between different trophic groups, but it is unclear if habitat restoration can recover these associations. In Sweden, restoration efforts have been applied to increase areas of semi-natural grassland previously remaining as small fragments due to abandonment. We assessed how the associations between plant and pollinator communities can be modified by grassland abandonment and restoration, together with landscape connectivity.
2. We surveyed plant, hoverfly and bee communities in 10 abandoned, 18 restored and 10 intact grasslands in south-central Sweden, distributed along a gradient of isolation from other species-rich grasslands. We assessed the effects of management history and connectivity on the relationships between several measures of the composition of plant and pollinator communities as well as between plant community composition and pollinator guilds.
3. The composition of the local flowering plant community was an important determin...