scholarly journals Urban Development Reduces Bee Abundance and Diversity

Author(s):  
Vera Wilder Pfeiffer ◽  
David W. Crowder ◽  
Janet Silbernagel

Abstract Wild bee communities persist in cities despite major disruption of nesting and food resources by urban development. Bee diversity and abundance is key for urban agriculture and maintenance of plant diversity, and assessing what aspects of cities enhance bee populations will promote our capacity to retain and provision bee habitat. Here, we assessed how variation in land cover and neighborhood development history affected bee communities in the midwestern US urban landscape of Madison, Wisconsin. We sampled bee communities across 38 sites with relatively high (> 55%) or low (< 30%) levels of impervious surface, and assessed effects of land use and neighborhood development history on bee abundance and species richness. We show abundance and richness of bees was lower in recently developed neighborhoods, with particularly strong negative effects on soil nesting bees. Soil nesting bees and bee community richness decreased as cover of impervious surface increased, but above ground nesting bees were minimally impacted. Bee community similarity varied spatially and based on dissimilar local land cover, only for soil nesting bees, and the overall bee community. Impervious surface limited bee abundance and diversity, but new neighborhoods were associated with greater negative effects. We suggest that enhancing the structural diversity of new neighborhoods in urban ecosystems may imitate the structural benefits of older neighborhoods for bee populations.

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Vera W Pfeiffer ◽  
David W Crowder ◽  
Janet Silbernagel

Wild bee communities persist in cities despite major disruption of nesting and food resources by urban development. Bee diversity and abundance is key for urban agriculture and maintenance of plant diversity, and assessing what aspects of cities enhance bee populations will promote our capacity to retain and provision bee habitat. Here, we assessed how variation in land cover and neighborhood development history affected bee communities in the midwestern US urban landscape of Madison, Wisconsin. We sampled bee communities across 38 sites with relatively high (> 55%) or low (< 30%) levels of impervious surface, and assessed effects of land use and neighborhood development history on bee abundance and species richness. We show abundance and richness of bees was lower in recently developed neighborhoods, with particularly strong negative effects on soil nesting bees. Soil nesting bees and bee community richness decreased as cover of impervious surface increased, but above ground nesting bees were minimally impacted. Bee community similarity varied spatially and based on dissimilar local land cover, only for soil nesting bees, and the overall bee community. Impervious surface limited bee abundance and diversity, but new neighborhoods were associated with greater negative effects. We suggest that enhancing the structural diversity of new neighborhoods in urban ecosystems may imitate the structural benefits of older neighborhoods for bee populations.


2020 ◽  
Vol 49 (2) ◽  
pp. 502-515 ◽  
Author(s):  
Brianne Du Clos ◽  
Francis A Drummond ◽  
Cynthia S Loftin

Abstract Homogeneous, agriculturally intense landscapes have abundant records of pollinator community research, though similar studies in the forest-dominated, heterogeneous mixed-use landscape that dominates the northeastern United States are sparse. Trends of landscape effects on wild bees are consistent across homogeneous agricultural landscapes, whereas reported studies in the northeastern United States have not found this consistency. Additionally, the role of noncrop habitat in mixed-use landscapes is understudied. We assessed wild bee communities in the mixed-use lowbush blueberry (Vaccinium angustifolium Ait.) production landscape of Maine, United States at 56 sites in eight land cover types across two regional landscapes and analyzed effects of floral resources, landscape pattern, and spatial scale on bee abundance and species richness. Within survey sites, cover types with abundant floral resources, including lowbush blueberry fields and urban areas, promoted wild bee abundance and diversity. Cover types with few floral resources such as coniferous and deciduous/mixed forest reduced bee abundance and species richness. In the surrounding landscape, lowbush blueberry promoted bee abundance and diversity, while emergent wetland and forested land cover strongly decreased these measures. Our analysis of landscape configuration revealed that patch mixing can promote wild bee abundance and diversity; however, this was influenced by strong variation across our study landscape. More surveys at intra-regional scales may lead to better understanding of the influence of mixed-use landscapes on bee communities.


2020 ◽  
Vol 49 (6) ◽  
pp. 1437-1448 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gabriel G Foote ◽  
Nathaniel E Foote ◽  
Justin B Runyon ◽  
Darrell W Ross ◽  
Christopher J Fettig

Abstract The status of wild bees has received increased interest following recent estimates of large-scale declines in their abundances across the United States. However, basic information is limited regarding the factors affecting wild bee communities in temperate coniferous forest ecosystems. To assess the early responses of bees to bark beetle disturbance, we sampled the bee community of a Douglas-fir, Pseudotsuga menziesii (Mirb.), forest in western Idaho, United States during a Douglas-fir beetle, Dendroctonus pseudotsugae Hopkins (Coleoptera: Curculionidae), outbreak beginning in summer 2016. We resampled the area in summer 2018 following reductions in forest canopy cover resulting from mortality of dominant and codominant Douglas-fir. Overall, results from rarefaction analyses indicated significant increases in bee diversity (Shannon’s H) in 2018 compared to 2016. Results from ANOVA also showed significant increases in bee abundance and diversity in 2018 compared to 2016. Poisson regression analyses revealed percent tree mortality from Douglas-fir beetle was positively correlated with increases in total bee abundance and species richness, where community response variables displayed a cubic trend with percent tree mortality. Percent reduction in canopy cover from 2016 to 2018 was also correlated with bee species richness and diversity. These findings suggest that wild bee communities may benefit from changes in forest structure following bark beetle outbreaks.


2013 ◽  
Vol 145 (6) ◽  
pp. 655-667 ◽  
Author(s):  
Amy C. Rutgers-Kelly ◽  
Miriam H. Richards

AbstractTo investigate how bee (Hymenoptera: Apoidea) communities repopulate habitat following severe disturbances, we compared assemblages in new, regenerating landfill sites planted in 2003, recent landfill sites planted in 2000, and control meadows relatively undisturbed for >40 years. All sites were identically sampled using pan traps and sweep netting, from early May to late September 2003, equalising collection effort among sites. In addition, we carried out five-minute aerial net samplings wherever sites contained large patches of wildflowers. We predicted that abundance and diversity of bees would be highest in recent sites and lowest in new sites. This prediction was partially supported: bees were most abundant in recent sites followed by control, then new sites, but species richness was highest (82 species) in recent sites, followed by new sites (67 species), then control (66 species). A randomisation analysis showed that there were more species than expected in new sites and fewer than expected in control sites. Differences in blossom availability likely explain differences in bee abundance and diversity among habitat regeneration levels. Overall, our results suggest that the bee community recolonised newly available sites immediately in the first year and that bee diversity and abundance increased for at least three years, subsequently declining between three and 40 years.


2019 ◽  
Vol 20 ◽  
pp. e00711 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anthony Abbate ◽  
Joshua W. Campbell ◽  
Chase B. Kimmel ◽  
William H. Kern

2011 ◽  
Vol 143 (3) ◽  
pp. 279-299 ◽  
Author(s):  
M.H. Richards ◽  
A. Rutgers-Kelly ◽  
J. Gibbs ◽  
J.L. Vickruck ◽  
S.M. Rehan ◽  
...  

AbstractThe bee fauna (Hymenoptera: Apoidea) of the Niagara Peninsula, at the eastern end of the Carolinian Zone in Ontario, Canada, is poorly known. From April to October 2003, we studied bee abundance and diversity in set-aside grasslands at Brock University and the Glenridge Quarry Naturalization Site in southern St. Catharines, Ontario. Using three sampling methods (pan traps, sweep nets, and aerial nets), we collected and identified 15 733 specimens of 124 species and morphospecies representing all bee families, except Melittidae, found in North America. Abundance-based diversity estimators suggested bee species richness to be as high as 148 species. There were three seasonal peaks in bee abundance (early spring, late spring, and mid-summer) with a lull in activity shortly after the summer solstice. Several indicators suggested substantial impacts of disturbance on the Niagara bee community, including evidence of high dominance by the most abundant species. Comparison of the sampling methods indicated considerable catch variation among taxa; Halictidae and Apidae were dominant in pan trap samples and in sweep–aerial net samples, respectively. However, bee abundances in pan traps and sweep nets were highly correlated, suggesting that both methods fairly sample local bee abundances.


2019 ◽  
pp. 24-29
Author(s):  
V V. Kafidov ◽  
V. N. Filippov ◽  
I. P. Filippova

The presented study addresses the problems of development of small and medium towns in Russia. Aim. The study aims to examine a town as a socio-economic environment where its residents exist and as the fundamental factor for the development of society.Tasks. The authors identify key problems in the development of small and medium Russian towns, which interferes with the historical appearance and has a negative impact on the living environment.Methods. Problems in the development of small and medium towns in Russia are examined using theoretical methods: systematic approach, statistical analysis, social and philosophical analysis.Results. The study identifies the main negative effects of the existing model of development of small and medium Russian towns, such as destruction of their historical and cultural appearance, distortion of the overall architectural motif, increased load on communications, and congestion of the transport infrastructure.Conclusions. At the current stage, efficient development of small and medium towns in Russia is impossible within the framework of the existing infill development. This chaotic process cannot be stopped without a new conceptual approach and changes in the legislative and normative framework of urban development. The only factor that determines the boundaries of the existing approach to urban development is the lack of physical space for new buildings in urban areas. The authors formulate proposals that would help to solve the problems of development of small and medium towns in Russia. 


2014 ◽  
Vol 83 (4) ◽  
pp. 325-351 ◽  
Author(s):  
Józef Banaszak ◽  
Halina Ratyńska

ABSTRACT Changes in communities of wild bees (Apiformes) were studied in relation to changes in vegetation in six permanent plots (natural forest habitats in the Wielkopolska National Park, and semi-natural habitats in the agricultural landscape near Turew) at the end of four decades (starting from the late 1970s). In 2008-2010, as many as 100 species of Apiformes were recorded there, which is more than reported in earlier decades. The most stable bee communities were those in forest habitats (oak-hornbeam forest, oak forest). Substantial qualitative and quantitative changes in vegetation and bee communities were recorded only after the renaturalisation of a former xerothermic grassland, which had become overgrown with shrubs and trees as a result of plant succession. Human interference (e.g. the felling of some trees growing along a road, clearance of understorey shrubs, ploughing of roadside margins) at selected refuge habitats in the agricultural landscape led to short-term fluctuations in bee abundance and diversity, but an increasing trend in abundance was noted.


2020 ◽  
Vol 60 ◽  
pp. e20206031
Author(s):  
Thaís Andrade Viana ◽  
Anete Pedro Lourenço

Bee populations are declining because of various synergistic threats, and therefore bee survey and monitoring programs are needed. Several techniques have been developed to survey bees, but the most cost-effective and suitable methods to sample bees in several sites at the same time are passive approaches, such as methods involving colored pan traps (also known as Moericke or bowl traps). Several bee surveys using pan traps have been conducted in North America, Europe, and Australia, but only a few such surveys have been done in tropical regions. We used colored pan traps (blue, yellow, and white) to assess the bee community in the Brazilian savanna ecosystem in Rio Preto State Park. Sampling was conducted in October 2013 and March 2014 along permanent trails. We also characterized the local habitat of each trail, and then we compared bee abundance with habitat complexity. In total, 187 individual bees (n = 15 species) were collected, mainly using blue and white traps. Although we were not able to sample most species that were previously recorded in this park, the pan trap method can be used to survey and monitor bee assemblages in combination with another sampling method. Habitat complexity also affected the numbers of bees sampled using the pan traps, and more bees were collected at open sites.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document