Abstract
Abstract The fauna of Euglossini bees is poorly known in savanna regions, making it difficult to understand how these bees use open vegetation environments. The aim of this study was to evaluate the influence of landscape structure on species abundance and composition of Euglossini bees in naturally heterogeneous savanna landscapes. Nine sites were sampled monthly using six traps with chemical baits. Three aromatic essences (eucalyptol, methyl salicylate and vanillin) were used to attract the Euglossini. Surrounding environmental conditions were measured using three independent variables, calculated in multiple scales: index of local vegetation and two landscape indices (Shannon Diversity and area-weighted shape). We compared the competing hypotheses through model selection based on Second-order Akaike Information Criterion (AICc). The four competing hypothesis were: (1) The local vegetation complexity favors Euglossini bees species richness and/or abundance (local vegetation hypothesis); (2) The proportion of the native vegetation types favors Euglossini bees species richness and/or abundance (habitat amount hypothesis); (3) Higher landscape diversity shall increase species richness of Euglossini bees (landscape heterogeneity hypothesis); (4) More complex landscape configuration shall favor the Euglossini bees richness and/or abundance (landscape heterogeneity hypothesis). We sampled 647 individuals belonging to six species of two distinct genera. Our results support the habitat amount hypothesis since bees’ abundance was strongly related with the proportion of habitat in the surrounding landscape. This may be related to the availability of floral and nesting resources in some types of savanna vegetation.
Highlights
Given the importance of Euglossini bees for wild pollination as well as the practicity of its sampling, many studies adopted them as biological models in order to understand how bees in general use their environment and how they can be affected by habitat loss, fragmentation and homogenization in landscapes (Powell & Powell 1987, Tonhasca et al 2002b, Viana et al 2006, Brosi et al 2007, Mendes et al 2008, Brosi 2009, Knoll & Penatti 2012, Silveira et al 2015, Aguiar et al 2015)
Others evidenced that Euglossini bees can cross large distances between forest patches or leave these forests during their resource foraging trips, what may help to explain why they appear to be little affected by fragmentation per se (Tonhasca et al 2002b, Tonhasca et al 2003, Milet-Pinheiro & Schlindwein 2005, Ramalho et al 2009, Brosi et al 2007, Rosa et al 2016)
The Euglossini fauna in savanna environments is relatively unknown in contrast with forested environments which are well studied for this group, especially considering the savanna physiognomies with low stratification profiles. Such lack of information about the importance of open vegetation types such as savanna for these bees deeply limits our understanding of the effects of landscape structure on Euglossini communities
Summary
Given the importance of Euglossini bees for wild pollination as well as the practicity of its sampling, many studies adopted them as biological models in order to understand how bees in general use their environment and how they can be affected by habitat loss, fragmentation and homogenization in landscapes (Powell & Powell 1987, Tonhasca et al 2002b, Viana et al 2006, Brosi et al 2007, Mendes et al 2008, Brosi 2009, Knoll & Penatti 2012, Silveira et al 2015, Aguiar et al 2015) These studies present mixed results, with most of them poorly delineated and conducted in forested environments. Such lack of information about the importance of open vegetation types such as savanna for these bees deeply limits our understanding of the effects of landscape structure on Euglossini communities
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