Honey bee introductions displace native bees and decrease pollination of a native wildflower

Page, Maureen L.; Williams, Neal M.

doi:10.1002/ecy.3939

Cited by 31 publications

(20 citation statements)

References 71 publications

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Section: The Response By the Community Of Native Bees In The Centralmentioning

confidence: 84%

“…Furthermore, all dominant plant species in Central Valley wildflower plantings refill nectar (M. Page; unpubli. data), and, although we lack complete data in the Sierra, one of the most dominant species, Camassia quamash , does not refill nectar (Page & Williams, 2023a). When plants refill nectar, this should theoretically increase end‐of‐day nectar availability, even across a backdrop of nectar competition.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Data available from the Dryad Digital Repository https://doi. org/10.25338/ B80S8F (Page & Williams, 2023b).…”

Section: Data Ava I L a B I L I T Y S Tat E M E N Tmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Evidence of exploitative competition between honey bees and native bees in two California landscapes

Page

Williams

2023

Journal of Animal Ecology

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Human‐mediated species introductions provide real‐time experiments in how communities respond to interspecific competition. For example, managed honey bees Apis mellifera (L.) have been widely introduced outside their native range and may compete with native bees for pollen and nectar. Indeed, multiple studies suggest that honey bees and native bees overlap in their use of floral resources. However, for resource overlap to negatively impact resource collection by native bees, resource availability must also decline, and few studies investigate impacts of honey bee competition on native bee floral visits and floral resource availability simultaneously. In this study, we investigate impacts of increasing honey bee abundance on native bee visitation patterns, pollen diets, and nectar and pollen resource availability in two Californian landscapes: wildflower plantings in the Central Valley and montane meadows in the Sierra. We collected data on bee visits to flowers, pollen and nectar availability, and pollen carried on bee bodies across multiple sites in the Sierra and Central Valley. We then constructed plant‐pollinator visitation networks to assess how increasing honey bee abundance impacted perceived apparent competition (PAC), a measure of niche overlap, and pollinator specialization (d'). We also compared PAC values against null expectations to address whether observed changes in niche overlap were greater or less than what we would expect given the relative abundances of interacting partners. We find clear evidence of exploitative competition in both ecosystems based on the following results: (1) honey bee competition increased niche overlap between honey bees and native bees, (2) increased honey bee abundance led to decreased pollen and nectar availability in flowers, and (3) native bee communities responded to competition by shifting their floral visits, with some becoming more specialized and others becoming more generalized depending on the ecosystem and bee taxon considered. Although native bees can adapt to honey bee competition by shifting their floral visits, the coexistence of honey bees and native bees is tenuous and will depend on floral resource availability. Preserving and augmenting floral resources is therefore essential in mitigating negative impacts of honey bee competition. In two California ecosystems, honey bee competition decreases pollen and nectar resource availability in flowers and alters native bee diets with potential implications for bee conservation and wildlands management.

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Section: The Response By the Community Of Native Bees In The Centralmentioning

confidence: 84%

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Evidence of exploitative competition between honey bees and native bees in two California landscapes

Page

Williams

2023

Journal of Animal Ecology

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“…However, the signi cant impact of honeybees' abundance on D. magni ca pollination e ciency provided compelling evidence for the detrimental effect of honeybees' abundance on orchid reproduction. Honeybee is well known for its modest e ciency in pollination service (Hung et al 2018;Page et al 2022) and in some cases is even possible to observe a shift from a mutualistic relationship between the plant and the pollinator to an antagonistic one where costs (i.e., associated with nectar replenishment or damage to owers) exceed the bene ts for the plant pollination (Aizen et al 2014).…”

Section: Orchid Pollination Success and E Ciency In Relation To Occur...mentioning

confidence: 99%

Introduced honeybees (Apis mellifera) in orchid pollination: surrogate pollinators or pollen wasters?

Scaccabarozzi

Guzzetti

Pioltelli

et al. 2023

Preprint

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Biological invasion is one of the leading threats to global biodiversity. Invasive species can change the structure and dynamics of landscapes, communities, and ecosystems, and even alter mutualistic relationships across species such as pollination. Orchids are one of the most threatened plant families globally and known to have established specialised pollination mechanism to reproduce, yet the impact of invasive bees on orchid reproduction has not been comprehensively assessed. We conduct a literature survey to document global patterns of the impact of invasive honeybees on orchids’ pollination. We then present a study case from Australian orchids, testing the extent to which introduced honeybees can successfully pollinate orchids across different degrees of habitat alteration, using Diuris brumalis and D. magnifica (Orchidaceae). Globally, Apis mellifera is the principal alien bee potentially involved in orchid pollination. We show that pollinator efficiency and fruit set in D. brumalis is higher in wild habitats in which both native bees and invasive honeybees are present, relative to altered habitat with introduced honeybees only. Pollen removal and fruit set of D. magnifica rise with native bees’ abundance whilst pollinator efficiency decreases with honeybee abundance and increases with habitat size. Complementarily to our findings, our literature survey suggests that the presence of introduced honeybees adversely impacts orchid pollination, likely via inefficient pollen transfer. Given the worldwide occurrence of introduced honeybees, we warn that some orchids may be negatively impacted by these alien pollinators, especially in altered and highly fragmented habitats where natural pollination networks are compromised.

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“…In general, honey bees are not able to replace the pollination services provided by wild bees (Garibaldi et al, 2012; Tylianakis, 2013). While this is more well studied in food crop systems, it also occurs in wild plants (Page & Williams, 2022).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Towards a better understanding of the relationships between pollinators, human well‐being, and medicine plants in the Great Lakes Region of Eastern North America

Gibson

Colla

2023

Plants People Planet

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Societal Impact StatementA diversity of values is needed to maximize the effectiveness of conservation planning, including policies and programs. The results of the United Nations Biodiversity Conference (COP 15) in Montreal, Canada, highlight the importance of a shift towards recognizing multiple ways of knowing in ecology and conservation. This review aims to provide a baseline of what is known about culturally significant plants in the Great Lakes Region of Eastern North America. The results of this research provide insight into the ways in which ecology has been conducted in the past and the importance of changing the way ecology is conducted in the future.SummaryBiocultural conservation theory allows for an examination of complex problems using systems thinking and conserving biological and cultural diversity together. In the Great Lakes Region of Eastern North America, wild medicine plants are an important part of what Anishinaabe people understand as Mini bimaadizi, or the good life, and of aki miijim, or traditional food systems. Given the various threats facing wild plant populations and continued global change, this review aims to investigate what is known about the pollination and breeding systems of culturally significant plants in the Great Lakes Region. The overall goal is to determine what proportion of these plants have had basic ecological studies done and the degree to which culturally significant plants in this region rely on insect pollination. A systematic review of the literature was conducted on breeding systems and pollination of culturally significant plants. Half of all the culturally significant plants included lacked specific information related to reproduction. Most plants that have been studied relied on outcrossing, and the most commonly reported pollinators were in the Apidae family. With the complex interactions between plants and pollinators and many insect pollinators experiencing population declines, it is important to determine the dependence of culturally significant plants on animal pollination. These findings will be relevant to conservation planning and policy in the future.

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Honey bee introductions displace native bees and decrease pollination of a native wildflower

Cited by 31 publications

References 71 publications

Evidence of exploitative competition between honey bees and native bees in two California landscapes

Evidence of exploitative competition between honey bees and native bees in two California landscapes

Introduced honeybees (Apis mellifera) in orchid pollination: surrogate pollinators or pollen wasters?

Towards a better understanding of the relationships between pollinators, human well‐being, and medicine plants in the Great Lakes Region of Eastern North America

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