Bee community composition and floral preferences in a Maryland old field ecosystem

Monday, November 14, 2022

8:00 AM – 8:12 AM PT

Location: Vancouver Convention Centre, Meeting Room 111/112

Presenting Author(s)

Sophia R. Gilbart (she/they)

Undergraduate Student Researcher
McDaniel College
Tanyetown, Maryland

Co-Author(s)

HG

Hailey D. Grzemkowski (she/her/hers)

Undergraduate Student Researcher
McDaniel College
Mechanicsville, Maryland
MH

Matthew J. Hodgdon

Undergraduate Student Researcher
McDaniel College
Mount Airy, Maryland
Lavinia M. Sherrill

Student
McDaniel College
Westminster, Maryland
HM

Holly Martinson

Assistant Professor
McDaniel College
Westminster, Maryland

With the current decline of bee populations and diversity across the globe, it is important to emphasize the promotion and protection of bees in our local ecosystems. However, given the diversity in appearance and behavior among bees, multiple different approaches to bee conservation may be needed. For example, flowering plants beneficial to larger honeybees and bumblebees may not be as beneficial to smaller, short-tongue bees. In this study, we observed and categorized floral preferences of several different bee families and genera in an old field ecosystem in Maryland, hypothesizing that bees would exhibit preferences for flower species or functional types (open vs tubular, single vs inflorescence). Over the course of this study, twice-yearly floral and bee surveys were conducted in 2021 and 2022. From there, analyses focused on the floral visitation of bee families and genera observed in the study site and the favored plants of each taxon. On the 16 species of flowering plants visited by pollinators in our experimental plots, we found a total of 9 bee genera. Furthermore, we found that larger-bodied bee genera such as Bombus and Apis preferred the large, tube-like flowers of Coronilla varia while smaller-bodied bee genera such as Ceratina and Lasioglossum preferred the smaller, more open Erigeron annuus and Hypericum perforatum. This knowledge emphasizes the importance of floral diversity to preserving the wide range of local bee species, as the most favored floral species in this experiment were phylogenetically and morphologically distinct.