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Parasitism of urban bumble bees influenced by pollinator taxonomic richness, local garden management, and surrounding impervious cover

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Abstract

As urban areas continue to expand globally, animal biodiversity is likely to experience altered habitat conditions, resource levels, and pathogen dynamics, with critical implications for insect pollinators. Specifically, local and regional land management may impact pollinator infectious disease prevalence, and this may be particularly relevant in urban garden systems where local food production depends on crop pollination. Further, because multi-host parasites can be spread across insect pollinator communities with varying impacts on host species, changes in pollinator community composition can lead to ‘amplification’ or ‘dilution’ effects, whereby increases in pollinator diversity could lead to higher or lower rates of parasitism, respectively. In this study, we investigate how urban garden management and regional landscape composition structure disease dynamics for a critical native pollinator, the bumble bee Bombus vosnesenskii. Parasite prevalence in our gardens was low in Nosema ceranae (1.06%) and Nosema bombi (1.06%), and Crithidia expoekii (0.5%), while we observed higher prevalence of Crithidia bombi (18%) and Apicystis bombi (6.4%). We found that gardens with higher pollinator taxonomic richness had significantly lower prevalence of Apicystis bombi in B. vosnesenskii hosts, providing evidence for the dilution effect. We also found that the prevalence of the parasite Crithidia bombi was significantly higher in gardens with higher mulch use and in gardens surrounded by greater proportions of impervious urban cover. Overall, we document a wide range of stressors facing urban bees, and show that parasitism is mediated by local ground management, regional land use, and pollinator community composition.

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Acknowledgements

We extend our deepest appreciation to the garden managers and community members at Aptos Garden, Beach Flats Community Garden, Berryessa Garden, Center for Agroecology and Sustainable Food Systems, Chinatown Community Garden, Coyote Creek Community Garden, El Jardín at Emma Prusch Park, The Forge at Santa Clara University, Giving Garden at Faith Lutheran Church, Homeless Garden Project, La Colina Community Garden, Laguna Seca Garden, The Live Oak Grange, MEarth at Carmel Valley Middle School, Mi Jardín Verde at All Saints’ Episcopal Church, Our Green Thumb Garden at Monterey Institute for International Studies, Salinas Garden at St. George’s Episcopal Church. A special thanks to the USDA Bee Lab and Dr. Jamie Strange who helped to train NAI in bee dissections and parasite detection.

Funding

This work is supported by the Sustainable Agroecosystems: Health, Functions, Processes, and Management Program (Grant No. 2016–67019-25185) from the USDA National Institute of Food and Agriculture.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Integrative Biology, University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX, USA

    Nicholas A. Ivers & Shalene Jha

  2. Environmental Studies Department, University of California, Santa Cruz, CA, USA

    Zacchariah Jordan, Hamutahl Cohen & Stacy Philpott

  3. USDA-ARS, Pollinating Insect Research Unit, Logan, UT, USA

    Amber Tripodi

  4. Centre for Ecology, Evolution & Behaviour, Department of Biological Sciences, School of Life Sciences and the Environment, Royal Holloway University of London, Egham, TW20 0EX, UK

    Mark J. F. Brown

  5. Seattle University, Seattle, WA, USA

    Heidi Liere

  6. CSIRO Land and Water Flagship, Dutton Park, Queensland, Australia

    Brenda B. Lin

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Ivers, N.A., Jordan, Z., Cohen, H. et al. Parasitism of urban bumble bees influenced by pollinator taxonomic richness, local garden management, and surrounding impervious cover. Urban Ecosyst 25, 1169–1179 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11252-022-01211-0

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