European small mammals in the agricultural landscape: an overview

Many small mammals are keystone species in European agricultural landscapes.They are an integral part of terrestrial food webs, affecting predator species by bottom-up trophic processes through fluctuating prey availability.Burrowing small mammals, as ecosystem engineers, can alter soil structure and nutrient fluxes and provide habitat structures for other animals in their tunnel systems.As seed dispersers and predators, they shape plant recruitment in many habitats.Despite these key contributions, there is a pervasive dialectic in the perception of rodents in the public eye as well as the scientific literature.They are the most diverse and abundant mammalian order and multiannual, highdensity fluctuations of widespread, generalist species like common vole (Microtus arvalis) can lead to high damage to crops and significant monetary losses in agriculture.