Abstract
Pollinator foraging fidelity (i.e., consistent and repeated visitation to a particular plant species or area) is poorly understood for most bee species, but is important information for both the conservation of plant and pollinator species and the ecosystem services they provide to humans. We used plant–pollinator surveys and mark–recapture of floral-visiting Hymenoptera to study the foraging fidelity and species interaction network properties of a plant–pollinator community in the tropical Andes of southern Ecuador. After marking 92 bees visiting six plant taxa along four 100-m transects between July 16th and July 31st of 2019, only honeybees were resighted at a recapture rate of 47.7% (41/86). During our surveys, we observed nine bee and two wasp taxa feeding from the flowers of 10 morphospecies of plants, and we found significantly low network nestedness and significantly high network-level specialization. Specialization (d′) was also significant for honeybees and bumblebees and for three plant taxa. Overall, our findings indicated that feral, non-native honeybees in this region dominated the local plant–pollinator network, yet this species is acting as a specialist forager at the individual level. Our results suggest that honeybees may be replacing the pollination services of some native bees and wasps in the region, but more research is needed to determine the effectiveness of honeybee pollination for the local plants.
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Upon request from corresponding author.
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Acknowledgements
We thank Samantha Rios, Ariana Velez, Andres Alvarez, and Melissa Jernakoff for fieldwork assistance and Ministerio del Ambiente Ecuador for the collecting permits.
Funding
We thank Wheaton College, Massachusetts, USA, and the Universidad del Azuay, Cuenca, Ecuador, for financial support.
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All authors contributed to the study conception and design. Rachel E. Crafford collected the data. Erin E. Wilson Rankin analyzed the data and edited the manuscript. Jessie L. Knowlton wrote the first draft of the manuscript. Boris A. Tinoco and Pablo S. Padrón provided taxonomic identifications and manuscript editing. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.
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All authors declare that any authorization needed for collecting biological specimens on environmental protected areas has been obtained from government authorities of the countries where collecting has taken place.
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Knowlton, J.L., Crafford, R.E., Tinoco, B.A. et al. High Foraging Fidelity and Plant-Pollinator Network Dominance of Non-native Honeybees (Apis mellifera) in the Ecuadorian Andes. Neotrop Entomol 51, 795–800 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13744-022-00967-6
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s13744-022-00967-6