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Escobedo-Kenefic N, Casiá-Ajché QB, Cardona E, Escobar-González D, Mejía-Coroy A, Enríquez E, Landaverde-González P. Landscape or local? Distinct responses of flower visitor diversity and interaction networks to different land use scales in agricultural tropical highlands. Front Sustain Food Syst 2022. [DOI: 10.3389/fsufs.2022.974215] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 12/14/2022] Open
Abstract
Land use change has been identified as a cause for biodiversity loss and has significant effects on pollinators and their interactions with plants. Interaction network analyses complement diversity estimators by providing information on the stability and functionality of the plant-pollinator community in an ecosystem. However, how land use changes affect insect diversity, and the structure of their plant-insect interaction networks, could depend on the intensity of the disturbance but also may be a matter of scale. Our study was carried out in a tropical highland landscape dominated by intense, yet diverse, small-scale agriculture. We studied the effects of land use, at a landscape scale, and local cover and plant ecological descriptors, at a local scale; on diversity descriptors of insect pollinator communities, the abundance of the most frequent flower visitors, and their interaction networks. Seminatural vegetation favored insect flower visitors at both scales. At the landscape scale, human settlements positively influenced bee diversity, and seminatural areas favored the abundance of frequent hoverfly and bumblebee species. At the local scale, bare soil cover negatively influenced honeybee abundance while flower-rich covers positively related to bumblebee abundance. Only local scale variables had influence on network metrics. Bare soil cover was related to higher network specialization, probably due to a low rate of honeybee interactions. Flower-rich covers negatively influenced network connectance but favored modularity. These results suggest that flower resources, provided by weed areas and flowering crops, promote a high rate of interactions between trophic levels and a non-random structure in the interaction networks that may be helping to sustain network stability. Our results highlight the role of seminatural vegetation, at both scales, in maintaining stable insect pollinator communities and interactions in heterogeneous agricultural landscapes of the tropics.
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Osterman J, Landaverde-González P, Garratt MP, Gee M, Mandelik Y, Langowska A, Miñarro M, Cole LJ, Eeraerts M, Bevk D, Avrech O, Koltowski Z, Trujillo-Elisea FI, Paxton RJ, Boreux V, Seymour CL, Howlett BG. On-farm experiences shape farmer knowledge, perceptions of pollinators, and management practices. Glob Ecol Conserv 2021. [DOI: 10.1016/j.gecco.2021.e01949] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/25/2022] Open
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Theodorou P, Herbst SC, Kahnt B, Landaverde-González P, Baltz LM, Osterman J, Paxton RJ. Urban fragmentation leads to lower floral diversity, with knock-on impacts on bee biodiversity. Sci Rep 2020; 10:21756. [PMID: 33303909 PMCID: PMC7730174 DOI: 10.1038/s41598-020-78736-x] [Citation(s) in RCA: 13] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/08/2020] [Accepted: 11/26/2020] [Indexed: 11/23/2022] Open
Abstract
Bees and flowering plants are two closely interacting groups of organisms. Habitat loss and fragmentation associated with urbanisation are major threats to both partners. Yet how and why bee and floral richness and diversity co-vary within the urban landscape remain unclear. Here, we sampled bees and flowering plants in urban green spaces to investigate how bee and flowering plant species richness, their phylogenetic diversity and pollination-relevant functional trait diversity influence each other in response to urban fragmentation. As expected, bee abundance and richness were positively related to flowering plant richness, with bee body size (but not bee richness and diversity) increasing with nectar-holder depth of flowering plants. Causal modelling indicated that bottom-up effects dictated patterns of bee-flower relationships, with urban fragmentation diminishing flowering plants richness and thereby indirectly reducing bee species richness and abundance. The close relationship between bees and flowering plants highlights the risks of their parallel declines in response to land-use change within the urban landscape.
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Affiliation(s)
- Panagiotis Theodorou
- General Zoology, Institute for Biology, Martin-Luther University Halle-Wittenberg, Hoher Weg 8, 06120, Halle (Saale), Germany.
| | - Sarah-Christine Herbst
- General Zoology, Institute for Biology, Martin-Luther University Halle-Wittenberg, Hoher Weg 8, 06120, Halle (Saale), Germany
| | - Belinda Kahnt
- General Zoology, Institute for Biology, Martin-Luther University Halle-Wittenberg, Hoher Weg 8, 06120, Halle (Saale), Germany
| | - Patricia Landaverde-González
- General Zoology, Institute for Biology, Martin-Luther University Halle-Wittenberg, Hoher Weg 8, 06120, Halle (Saale), Germany
- Unidad para el Conocimiento, Uso y Valoración de la Biodiversidad, Centro de Estudios Conservacionistas-CECON-, Facultad de Ciencias Químicas y Farmacia, Universidad de San Carlos de Guatemala, Avenida La Reforma 0-63 zona 10, 01010, Ciudad de Guatemala, Guatemala
| | - Lucie M Baltz
- General Zoology, Institute for Biology, Martin-Luther University Halle-Wittenberg, Hoher Weg 8, 06120, Halle (Saale), Germany
| | - Julia Osterman
- General Zoology, Institute for Biology, Martin-Luther University Halle-Wittenberg, Hoher Weg 8, 06120, Halle (Saale), Germany
- Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research-UFZ Leipzig, ESCALATE, Department of Computational Landscape Ecology, Permoserstrasse 15, 04318, Leipzig, Germany
| | - Robert J Paxton
- General Zoology, Institute for Biology, Martin-Luther University Halle-Wittenberg, Hoher Weg 8, 06120, Halle (Saale), Germany
- German Centre for Integrative Biodiversity Research (iDiv) Halle-Jena-Leipzig, Deutscher Platz 5e, 04103, Leipzig, Germany
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Escobedo-Kenefic N, Landaverde-González P, Theodorou P, Cardona E, Dardón MJ, Martínez O, Domínguez CA. Disentangling the effects of local resources, landscape heterogeneity and climatic seasonality on bee diversity and plant-pollinator networks in tropical highlands. Oecologia 2020; 194:333-344. [PMID: 32712873 DOI: 10.1007/s00442-020-04715-8] [Citation(s) in RCA: 8] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/29/2019] [Accepted: 07/16/2020] [Indexed: 11/29/2022]
Abstract
Land-use alteration and climate seasonality have profound effects on bee species diversity by influencing the availability of nesting and floral resources. Here, using twelve sites embedded in an agriculture-forest mosaic in the tropical highlands of Guatemala, we investigated the relative effects of climate seasonality and landscape heterogeneity on bee and floral-resource community structure and on their mutualistic network architecture. We found that climate seasonality affected bee diversity, which was higher in the wet season and associated positively with the availability of floral resources across both seasons. Bee community composition also differed between seasons and it was mainly driven by floral-resource richness and the proportion of agricultural, semi-natural and forest cover. In addition to the effects on bee diversity, climate seasonality also affected flower-bee visitation networks. We documented higher relative (null model corrected) nestedness in the dry season compared to the wet season. Niche partitioning as a result of competition for scarce resources in the dry season could be the process driving the differences in the network structure between seasons. Furthermore, relative nestedness was consistently smaller than zero, and relative modularity and specialization were consistently larger than zero in both seasons, suggesting the existence of isolated groups of interacting partners in all our flower-bee visitation networks. Our results highlight the effect of climatic seasonality and the importance of preserving local floral resources and natural heterogeneous habitats for the conservation of bee communities and their pollination services in tropical highlands.
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Affiliation(s)
- Natalia Escobedo-Kenefic
- Unidad para el Conocimiento, Uso y Valoración de la Biodiversidad, Centro de Estudios Conservacionistas-CECON-, Facultad de Ciencias Químicas y Farmacia, Universidad de San Carlos de Guatemala, Avenida La Reforma 0-63 zona 10, 01010, Ciudad de Guatemala, Guatemala.,Departamento de Ecología Evolutiva, Instituto de Ecología, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, 70-275, 04510, Ciudad de México, México
| | - Patricia Landaverde-González
- Unidad para el Conocimiento, Uso y Valoración de la Biodiversidad, Centro de Estudios Conservacionistas-CECON-, Facultad de Ciencias Químicas y Farmacia, Universidad de San Carlos de Guatemala, Avenida La Reforma 0-63 zona 10, 01010, Ciudad de Guatemala, Guatemala. .,General Zoology, Institute for Biology, Martin-Luther University Halle-Wittenberg, Hoher Weg 8, 06120, Halle, Saale, Germany.
| | - Panagiotis Theodorou
- General Zoology, Institute for Biology, Martin-Luther University Halle-Wittenberg, Hoher Weg 8, 06120, Halle, Saale, Germany.
| | - Edson Cardona
- Unidad para el Conocimiento, Uso y Valoración de la Biodiversidad, Centro de Estudios Conservacionistas-CECON-, Facultad de Ciencias Químicas y Farmacia, Universidad de San Carlos de Guatemala, Avenida La Reforma 0-63 zona 10, 01010, Ciudad de Guatemala, Guatemala
| | - María José Dardón
- Faculty of Life Sciences, Humboldt-University of Berlin, Albrecht Daniel Thaer-Institute of Agricultural and Horticultural Sciences, Albrecht-Thaer-Weg 5, Berlin, D-14195, Germany
| | - Oscar Martínez
- Unidad para el Conocimiento, Uso y Valoración de la Biodiversidad, Centro de Estudios Conservacionistas-CECON-, Facultad de Ciencias Químicas y Farmacia, Universidad de San Carlos de Guatemala, Avenida La Reforma 0-63 zona 10, 01010, Ciudad de Guatemala, Guatemala.,Departamento de Agricultura, Sociedad y Ambiente, El Colegio de La Frontera Sur, Carretera Panamericana y Periférico Sur s/n, Barrio María Auxiliadora, San Cristóbal de Las Casas, 29290, Chiapas, México
| | - César A Domínguez
- Departamento de Ecología Evolutiva, Instituto de Ecología, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, 70-275, 04510, Ciudad de México, México.
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Landaverde-González P, Menes M, Melgar S, Bustamante D, Monroy C. Common pattern of distribution for Mesoamerican Triatoma dimidiata suggest geological and ecological association. Acta Trop 2020; 204:105329. [DOI: 10.1016/j.actatropica.2020.105329] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/22/2019] [Revised: 12/09/2019] [Accepted: 01/01/2020] [Indexed: 01/17/2023]
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Landaverde-González P, Quezada-Euán JJG, Theodorou P, Murray TE, Husemann M, Ayala R, Moo-Valle H, Vandame R, Paxton RJ. Sweat bees on hot chillies: provision of pollination services by native bees in traditional slash-and-burn agriculture in the Yucatán Peninsula of tropical Mexico. J Appl Ecol 2017; 54:1814-1824. [PMID: 29200497 PMCID: PMC5697652 DOI: 10.1111/1365-2664.12860] [Citation(s) in RCA: 14] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/30/2016] [Accepted: 12/20/2016] [Indexed: 11/29/2022]
Abstract
Traditional tropical agriculture often entails a form of slash-and-burn land management that may adversely affect ecosystem services such as pollination, which are required for successful crop yields. The Yucatán Peninsula of Mexico has a >4000 year history of traditional slash-and-burn agriculture, termed 'milpa'. Hot 'Habanero' chilli is a major pollinator-dependent crop that nowadays is often grown in monoculture within the milpa system.We studied 37 local farmers' chilli fields (sites) to evaluate the effects of landscape composition on bee communities. At 11 of these sites, we undertook experimental pollination treatments to quantify the pollination of chilli. We further explored the relationships between landscape composition, bee communities and pollination service provision to chilli.Bee species richness, particularly species of the family Apidae, was positively related to the amount of forest cover. Species diversity decreased with increasing proportion of crop land surrounding each sampling site. Sweat bees of the genus Lasioglossum were the most abundant bee taxon in chilli fields and, in contrast to other bee species, increased in abundance with the proportion of fallow land, gardens and pastures which are an integral part of the milpa system.There was an average pollination shortfall of 21% for chilli across all sites; yet the shortfall was unrelated to the proportion of land covered by crops. Rather, chilli pollination was positively related to the abundance of Lasioglossum bees, probably an important pollinator of chilli, as well indirectly to the proportion of fallow land, gardens and pastures that promote Lasioglossum abundance. Synthesis and applications. Current, low-intensity traditional slash-and-burn (milpa) agriculture provides Lasioglossum spp. pollinators for successful chilli production; fallow land, gardens and pasture therefore need to be valued as important habitats for these and related ground-nesting bee species. However, the negative impact of agriculture on total bee species diversity highlights how agricultural intensification is likely to reduce pollination services to crops, including chilli. Indeed, natural forest cover is vital in tropical Yucatán to maintain a rich assemblage of bee species and the provision of pollination services for diverse crops and wild flowers.
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Affiliation(s)
- Patricia Landaverde-González
- General Zoology Institute for Biology Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg Halle (Saale) Germany
- Department of Computational Landscape Ecology UFZ - Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research Leipzig Germany
| | - José Javier G Quezada-Euán
- Departamento de Apicultura Tropical Campus Ciencias Biológicas y Agropecuarias Universidad Autónoma de Yucatán Mérida México
| | - Panagiotis Theodorou
- General Zoology Institute for Biology Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg Halle (Saale) Germany
- German Centre for Integrative Biodiversity Research (iDiv) Halle-Jena-Leipzig Leipzig Germany
| | - Tomás E Murray
- General Zoology Institute for Biology Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg Halle (Saale) Germany
- National Biodiversity Data Centre Waterford Ireland
| | - Martin Husemann
- General Zoology Institute for Biology Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg Halle (Saale) Germany
| | - Ricardo Ayala
- Estación de Biología Chamela (Sede Colima) Instituto de Biología Universidad nacional Autónoma de México San Patricio Jalisco México
| | - Humberto Moo-Valle
- Departamento de Apicultura Tropical Campus Ciencias Biológicas y Agropecuarias Universidad Autónoma de Yucatán Mérida México
| | - Rémy Vandame
- Departamento Agricultura Sociedad y Ambiente El Colegio de la Frontera Sur Carretera Panamericana y Periférico Sur s/n María Auxiliadora Chiapas México
| | - Robert J Paxton
- General Zoology Institute for Biology Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg Halle (Saale) Germany
- German Centre for Integrative Biodiversity Research (iDiv) Halle-Jena-Leipzig Leipzig Germany
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