Bees (Hymenoptera: Apoidea: Apidae s.l.) captured with Malaise and pan traps along an altitudinal gradient in the Parque Estadual da Serra do Mar, Ubatuba, São Paulo, Brazil

Abstract

A list of bee species surveyed along an altitudinal gradient in Ubatuba, Brazil using Malaise and pan traps is presented. A total of 289 individuals representing 57 species, 33 genera, and 5 subfamilies were collected. Most individuals and species were collected at around 600 m altitude, and almost all species were collected with Malaise traps. Detrended Correspondence Analysis revealed a correlation between the occurrence of stingless bees and the altitude, confirming the usefulness of stingless-bee communities to reveal gradient patterns.

Sampling bees in tropical forests and agroecosystems: a review

“…While a number of studies have assessed the efficiency of bee sampling methods in temperate regions (Cane et al 2000;Roulston et al 2007;Campbell and Hanula 2007;Wilson et al 2008;Baum and Wallen 2011;Grundel et al 2011;Geroff et al 2014), few have done so in tropical forests (Smith-Pardo and Gonzalez 2007;Brosi et al 2008;Gonçalves et al 2012;Pannure and Chandrashekara 2013). We found that several studies assessed the relative effectiveness of sweep nets, pan traps, bait traps and malaise traps, but we found only one that did so for timed observations and none for aspirators.…”

“…Pan traps provide visual cues detected by bees, with highest capture rates in full sun. For this reason, pan traps are not ideal for sampling under forest or agroforest canopies (Campbell and Hanula 2007;Brosi et al 2008;Gonçalves et al 2012;Droege 2015). Most often, pan traps are set on the ground (e.g.…”

Preliminary results of bowl trapping bees (Hymenoptera, Apoidea) in a southern Brazil forest fragment

“…Structured inventories or systematic surveys provide data to understand the role of bees in ecosystems which is useful for detecting long-term faunal alterations, such as those caused by global warming (Gonçalves et al 2012;Williams et al 2001). In these inventories, bees are commonly sampled by hand-netting, and melittologists, especially Brazilians, have adopted the standard protocol of collecting bees at flowers, in a delimited area or transect, for a year period (Sakagami et al 1967).…”

“…This method has recently gained increased attention among melittologists, especially after the contribution of Droege et al (2010). Published studies from Brazil reached to different conclusions about the performance of this sampling method, some reporting efficient captures (Krug & Alves-Dos-Santos 2008;Souza & Campos 2008), but others reporting very poor performances (Gonçalves & Brandão 2008;Gonçalves et al 2012). Currently, at least 11 studies using pan traps have been carried out in different regions of the country (as reported by Simões et al 2012).…”

“…According to Cane et al (2001), bowl traps have selective biases, especially for the collection of many large-bodied species (Roulston et al 2007;Minckley 2008; but see Krewenka et al 2001;Stephen & Rao 2005 reports of bumblebee sampling). Also, they have a low performance when compared with hand-netting and malaise traps in dense forested areas (Gonçalves & Brandão 2008;Gonçalves et al 2012). Other important issues are related to the type and placement of bowl traps, which can influence their efficiency (Gollan et al 2010), such as spacing among each unit (Droege et al 2010), elevation of the traps (Campbell & Hanula 2007;Tuell & Isaacs 2011), bowl colors and selectivity of bees (Campbell & Hanula 2007;Krug & Alves-dos-Santos 2008;Wilson et al 2008), habitat heterogeneity (Droege et al 2010), and fragment size (Aizen & Feinsinger 1994).…”