Continuous Micro-Environments Associated Orchid Bees Benefit from an Atlantic Forest Remnant, Paraná State, Brazil

Abstract

The fragmentation and habitat loss are the main causes of pollinators decline worldwide, however very little is known about the composition and distribution of neotropical pollinators along continuous micro-environments. To fill this gap, we carried out samplings of Euglossini bees in a continuous area of forest with micro-environments of primary (remnant) and secondary (regeneration) forest of Atlantic Forest. We evaluated the differences in the composition and uniformity of orchid bees in different micro-environments, in order to characterize the responses of the local environmental changes in the attraction of bees to chemical traps. Our results indicated that the composition and uniformity were similar between the two forest fragments studied here, although there are greater abundance of some species by micro-environments. We conclude that the characteristics of the sites in a continuous environment with primary and secondary forest do not seem to have an effect on the composition of the Euglossini fauna, and that the chemical substances are complementary in the attractiveness of the orchid bee males. Thus, our findings suggest that micro-environments in a continuous matrix near forest remnants can help to promote the reintegration of the orchid bee communities and contribute to the conservation of areas in process of forest regeneration.

Recover and They’ll Come: Flower Visiting Bees Benefit from the Continuous of Micro-Environments Set by Regenerating Forest Fragments

“…This fact can be evidenced by the occurrence of the same 17 species of bees in the mature and regenerating forest (see appendix 1). It is well known that the habitat fragmentation affects the abundance and richness of bees, as well as the biological flows between landscapes (Ferreira et al, 2015;Boscolo et al, 2017;Sobreiro et al, 2019;Rotchés-Ribalta et al, 2018). However, our results indicate that a large part of the bee species recorded here are less sensitive to the more fragmented habitat (regenerating forest).…”

“…However, the effects of environmental changes on local landscapes cannot be excluded. In this regard, recent studies have shown that the landscapes that surround the forest matrix can influence the composition and distribution of bees (Marques et al, 2018;Rollin et al, 2019;Sobreiro et al, 2019), due to the permeability of these pollinating insects can be affected by the functional connectivity and heterogeneity of the landscape (Boscolo et al, 2017). Therefore, understanding the potential effects of local environmental changes on the diversity of bees can help to promote conservation strategies and improve the survival chances of these insects.…”

“…In South America, forest refuges cover an area of 842 million hectares, which represents 27% of the world's forest cover (Fao, 2016), among them, the Atlantic Forest is one of the most threatened hotspots on the planet, with only 11.73% of its original cover, distributed in small (<50 ha) and isolated forest fragments (Ribeiro et al, 2009). These forest fragments of the biome are formed by different microhabitats that are rarely considered in studies of bee diversity and flow, although recent results indicate the capacity of these pollinators to inhabit increasingly fragmented and anthropized forests (Neame et al, 2012;Botsch et al, 2017), therefore, these green patches are important sources of food and nesting resources for bees, and often serve as the only source in urban areas (Hausmann et al, 2016;Sobreiro et al, 2019;Odanaka & Rehan, 2020).…”

“…In another study (Hamblin et al, 2018), the authors investigated the importance of urban green refuges and the effects of the heat islands (cities) on the bee community, they found that more than 1/3 of the abundance of bees decreased when the temperature increased, and that floral enrichment in warmer landscapes had little effect on the diversity of small bees. On the other hand, the successional diversification of the landscape can serve as stepping stones between fragments of mature forests, being used as a foraging reservoir for different species of bees (Sobreiro et al, 2019;Odanaka & Rehan, 2020). Thus, although these studies have investigated the flow of bees at different stages of the forest and geographical scales (β and γ), they show that environmental and climatic conditions are important factors in the distribution of bee species and community composition within forest fragments.…”

“…Despite their apparent importance in the distribution of bees, the role of different micro-environments in the floral visits of bees is not yet well understood, although previous studies have shown that these micro-habitats are able to offer different foraging resources and serve as a reservoir for the diversity of bees (Boscolo et al, 2017;Odanaka & Rehan, 2020). Observers of a recent research have shown that a continuous matrix of regenerating micro-environments can favor the reintegration of bee communities that are attracted by chemical traps (Sobreiro et al, 2019). However, we are not aware of studies that have compared bee visits to flowers in multiple micro-environments within a continuous of mature and regenerating forest.…”