Wildness and Wild Spaces in Residential Yards: Changing Neighborhood Norms to Support Pollinator Populations

Insect pollinator populations, critical to the global food supply, are declining. Research has found robust bee communities in cities, which are supported by diverse urban habitat and foraging resources. Accounting for 35–50% of urban green space, U.S. private residential yards can serve as important forage and nesting sources for pollinators. Incorporating wild attributes and wildness, such as native vegetation and less intensive yard-management practices, is key. However, urban vegetation, and its effects on local native bee populations, is shaped by social and cultural preferences, norms, aesthetics, values, and identities. The perfect lawn ideal of a highly manicured turfgrass yard dominates neighborhood landscapes and is often at odds with the habitat needs of pollinators. As part of a three-year study investigating the sociocultural drivers of residential vegetation choices in St. Louis, MO, USA, we interviewed 85 decisionmakers in order to understand choices about private residential yard maintenance. This paper presents an emergent finding concerning how residents conceptualize and talk about the urban-yard aesthetic, using the terms "wild" and "wildness", which reflect a range of levels in the demand for urban wild spaces in their neighborhoods. The discourse of wildness offers a nontechnical route for understanding the connections between the ecological consequences of urbanization, with human attitudes towards nature that shape the biological functioning of human-generated habitats.

Promoting Forage Legume–Pollinator Interactions: Integrating Crop Pollination Management, Native Beekeeping and Silvopastoral Systems in Tropical Latin America

Major declines of insect pollinators are a worldwide concern. Such losses threaten human food supplies and ecosystem functions. Monocultures of pastures used to feed cattle are among the drivers of insect pollinator declines in Tropical Latin America. Plants of the legume family (fabaceae) are mostly pollinated by insects, in particular by bees. The inclusion of legumes in pastures (grass-legume system), as forage banks or the development of silvo-pastoral systems (SPS) with tree legumes, has been widely promoted to improve livestock production and soil fertility, but not to enhance ecosystem services from pollinators. Shortages of seed for the establishment of legumes as forage banks or within pastures or SPS remain a bottleneck for the improvement of ecosystem services brought about by pollinators within these systems and beyond. In this perspective paper, we provide an overview of forage legumes, their interplay with pollinators, and the ecological and socio-economic benefits of pollinator–forage legume interactions, at different scales (farm and landscape level). We further discuss the challenges and opportunities of scaling sustainably intensified cattle production systems that integrate legume forage-seed production with principles of pollinator ecology and native beekeeping. Finally, we provide interested stakeholders, policy-and decision-makers with a perspective on how such agroecosystems may be designed and scaled into multifunctional landscapes.

Veterinarians and beekeeping: What roles, expectations and future perspectives? - a review paper

Apiculture is an important economy sector, facing a real health crisis. Honeybees, as well as other insect pollinator populations have been in decline over recent decades, and diseases are one of the principal challenges. To face this situation, public and private veterinary services are needed to manage surveillance, control, eradication and prevention measures of honeybee diseases within their territories, in close collaboration with beekeepers and farmers. It is necessary urgently to clarify the current problems and threats to apiculture in the public health sector. Due to possible interactions between bee health and production, the negative effects of environmental xenobiotics and climate change, this field must be considered as an interdisciplinary research issue. Moreover, honeybee veterinary medicine is increasingly engaged in the One Health approach, due to the possibility that the poor health of honeybee colonies affects human life. This review identified the key veterinarian roles, gaps in their higher education curriculum, as well as the necessity for research linkage between expectations and professional perspectives.

A global review of urban pollinators and implications for maintaining pollination services in tropical cities

Pollinators provide essential ecosystem services worldwide, but dependence on biotic pollination is higher in the tropics, where urbanization is expected to impact biodiversity more severely. Here, we present a global review on urban pollinator studies with emphasis on the tropics. From the 308 published studies that included information on pollinator groups, only ~25 % were conducted in tropical regions, while ~65 % were carried out in the non-tropical northern hemisphere. This overall trend was similar for all the major insect pollinator groups, but not for vertebrates, which were overall less studied in both tropical and non-tropical regions. The effects of urbanization on tropical pollinators are diverse and complex and likely depend on the extent and type of urbanization, as well as the pollinator taxa studied. For both insect and vertebrate pollinators, the existing studies suggest that tropical cities can support generalist species tolerant of human activity, but the lack of studies hampers other general conclusions. The underrepresentation of pollinator studies in tropical cities undermines the value of urban biodiversity conservation in the most biodiverse regions of the world and highlights a missing opportunity. Since promoting urban biodiversity benefits both nature and people, it could be especially relevant in the Global South, where economic and social inequalities are severe and pollinator conservation may contribute to sustainability goals. In this context, initiatives that foster more international collaborations and research in the tropics are essential for a better understanding of the effects of urbanization and the value of pollinators in urban areas. Such knowledge can provide the basis for better urban planning strategies that contribute to the conservation of biodiversity and maintenance of pollination services in tropical cities.

Nocturnal insect pollinator diversity and species richness in Ridge gourd, Luffa acutangula

Pollinators are rewarding for many wild and agricultural crop plants. The experiments were conducted in the agricultural field of Karad tehsil, Maharashtra, India. The present study concentrated on the diversity and species richness of nocturnal insect pollinators on Ridge gourd Luffa acutangula belonging to the family Cucurbitaceae. The Ridge gourd plant is monoecious with a bunch of male flowers and solitary female flower. Anthesis happened in late evening hours (17.00-19.00) and flowers remained for 13 to 14 hours. A total of 830 insect pollinators were sampled from June 2020 to November 2020. Altogether 17 species of insect pollinators belonging to 7 families under 6 orders were recorded. Among the total number of species, the Lepidoptera was the dominant order comprising 11 species belonging to the single family Crambidae followed by Blattodea comprising 2 species belonging to 2 families Ectobiidae and Blattidae. Hymenoptera comprised 1 species belonging to family Formicidae, followed by order Orthoptera comprising 1 species belonging to family Gryllidae, order Diptera comprising 1 species belonging to the family Culicidae, followed by the order Coleoptera comprising 1 species belonging to the family Chrysomelidae. The Diaphnia hyalinata belonging to family Crambidae of the order Lepidoptera was the most dominant species and was followed by Chabula acamasalis. The nocturnal species imparted pollination services to agricultural crops. The study also observed fundamental mechanisms of plant and nocturnal insect pollinator interaction as well as floral scent and visual signals. The study can be baseline data for conserving and managing the best pollinators for increasing the yield of Ridge gourd.