Historical and citizen-reported data show shifts in bumblebee phenology over the last century in Sweden

Abstract

Bumblebees are a key taxon contributing to the provision of crop pollination and ecosystem functioning. However, land use and climate change are two of the main factors causing bee decline across the world. In this study, we investigated how the flight period of bumblebee spring queens has shifted over the last century in Sweden, and to what extent such shifts depended on climate change, landscape context, latitude, and the phenology of bumblebee species. We studied ten species of bumblebees and used observations from museum specimens covering 117 years from the southernmost region in Sweden (Scania), combined with citizen-reported observations during the past 20 years across Sweden. We found that the flight period of bumblebees has advanced by 5 days on average during the last 20 years across Sweden. In the agriculture-dominated region of Scania, we found that in the late 2010s bumblebee spring queen activity in simplified landscapes had advanced by on average 14 days, compared to 100 years ago. In addition, in simplified landscapes the flight period of early species was significantly earlier compared to in complex landscapes. Our results provide knowledge on the intraspecific variation of phenological traits, indicating that early species (often common species) exhibit a higher plastic response to the environment, which may facilitate adaptation to both climate and landscape changes, compared to the late species of which many are declining.

Historical marine ecology using non-traditional data sources reveals the impact of local and global processes over half a century

“…Understanding historical changes in marine ecosystems requires consideration of novel data sets and the application of diverse social and life science methodologies (Balée 2006). Novel or non-traditional historical data sets can include popular media articles, artworks, museum collections and opportunistic samples (Thurstan et al 2015, Blasi et al, 2023). Here we de ne "non-traditional" data sources as any data that fall outside the traditional scienti c method, in which data collection is systematically designed to address a hypothesis or research question (Bryman 2015).…”

Evolutionary plant–pollinator responses to anthropogenic land‐use change: impacts on ecosystem services

“…Beyond morphology, plant–pollinator interactions may lead to changes in phenology. For example, insects may evolve novel life‐history strategies better to match temperature‐driven shifts in plant phenology (Burkle et al ., 2013), but the ability to shift may vary among taxa (Blasi et al ., 2023). Crop phenology is affected by both prevailing climate and plant breeding and may thus be purposely buffered against tracking climatic variation (Menzel et al ., 2006), while wild plants and pollinators may exhibit shared climatic responses (Bartomeus et al ., 2011).…”

New citizen science initiative enhances flowering onset predictions for fruit trees in Great Britain

“…Citizen science, defined as ‘the involvement of non-professionals in scientific investigations’ [ 12 ], can be either systematic (with a standardized survey procedure) or opportunistic (ad hoc recordings) and has often been used in place of data collected by traditional scientific protocols to detect phenological change in a wide range of taxa, including forest trees [ 13 ], bumblebees [ 14 ], plants [ 15 ], and birds [ 16 ].…”