Microhabitats created by log landings support abundant flowers and insect pollinators within regenerating mixed-oak stands in the Central Appalachian Mountains

Lee, Monica R.; McNeil, Darin J.; Mathis, Codey L.; Grozinger, Christina M.; Larkin, Jeffery L.

doi:10.1016/j.foreco.2021.119472

Cited by 8 publications

(12 citation statements)

References 63 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…It is also possible that early seral forest in the surrounding landscape had relatively limited effects on bee communities in young stands because movement between early seral forest patches was facilitated by landscape features that were used as corridors (Hanula et al, 2016). For example, secondary roads are prominent landscape features in managed forest landscapes (Forman & Alexander, 1998) that can provide foraging and nesting habitats (Hanula et al, 2016; Lee et al, 2021; Wojcik & Buchmann, 2012) and act as navigational landmarks (Brebner et al, 2021; Kheradmand & Nieh, 2019). Further study is needed to understand the value of secondary roads to wild bees in managed forests and the extent to which they contribute to the connectivity of bee populations in early seral forest.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Associated revenue trade‐offs may be low in some economic scenarios (Kormann et al, 2021) allowing “win–win” outcomes for timber production and biodiversity conservation. Including native bee‐pollinated plant species in seed mixes used for roadside and log landing revegetation and erosion control may also supplement and potentially fill phenological and nutritional gaps in floral resources of early seral plant communities (Lee et al, 2021; Wojcik & Buchmann, 2012). In cases in which biodiversity conservation is a primary goal of conifer forest management, approaches that prolong the pre‐canopy closure period are likely to be particularly effective for promoting wild bee communities.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

Bee diversity decreases rapidly with time since harvest in intensively managed conifer forests

Zitomer

Galbraith

Betts

et al. 2023

Ecological Applications

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Despite widespread concerns about the anthropogenic drivers of global pollinator declines, little information is available about the impacts of land management practices on wild bees outside of agricultural systems, including in forests managed intensively for wood production. We assessed changes in wild bee communities with time since harvest in 60 intensively managed Douglas-fir (Pseudotsuga menziesii) stands across a gradient in stand ages spanning a typical harvest rotation. We measured bee abundance, species richness, and alpha and beta diversity, as well as habitat characteristics (i.e., floral resources, nesting substrates, understory vegetation, and early seral forest in the surrounding landscape) during the spring and summer of 2018 and 2019.We found that bee abundance and species richness declined rapidly with stand age, decreasing by 61% and 48%, respectively, for every 5 years since timber harvest. Asymptotic estimates of Shannon and Simpson diversity were highest in stands 6-10 years post-harvest and lowest after the forest canopy had closed, ~11 years post-harvest. Bee communities in older stands were nested subsets of bee communities found in younger stands, indicating that changes were due to species loss rather than turnover as the stands aged. Bee abundance-but not species richness-was positively associated with floral resource density, and neither metric was associated with floral richness. The amount of early seral forest in the surrounding landscape seemed to enhance bee species richness in older, closed-canopy stands, but otherwise had little effect. Changes in the relative abundance of bee species did not relate to bee functional characteristics such as sociality, diet breadth, or nesting substrate. Our study demonstrates that Douglas-fir plantations develop diverse communities of wild bees shortly after harvest, but those communities erode rapidly over time as forest canopies close. Therefore, stand-scale management activities that prolong the precanopy closure period and enhance floral resources during the initial stage of stand regeneration will provide the greatest opportunity to enhance bee diversity in landscapes dominated by intensively managed conifer forests.K E Y W O R D S bees, early seral forest, forest biodiversity, intensive forest management, pollinator, timber plantation

show abstract

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Bee diversity decreases rapidly with time since harvest in intensively managed conifer forests

Zitomer

Galbraith

Betts

et al. 2023

Ecological Applications

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Understanding the habitat needs of native bees is key to developing measures to conserve their populations (Neumüller et al, 2020; Tonietto & Larkin, 2017; Williams et al, 2010). Studies have reported higher bee abundance and species richness in disturbed areas, including powerline rights‐of‐way (Russell et al, 2018; Wagner et al, 2014; Wagner et al, 2019), thinned or cleared forest (Campbell et al, 2018; Hanula et al, 2015; Lee et al, 2021; Mathis et al, 2021; Roberts et al, 2017), and managed barrens (Bried & Dillion, 2012; Winfree et al, 2007), likely due to the increased floral resources and nesting substrates newly made available (Milam et al, 2018; Tonietto & Larkin, 2017). As a result, management for early‐successional conditions is increasingly practiced with the intention of promoting more abundant and diverse bee communities (Natural Resources Conservation Service, 2017).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The contribution of canopy samples to assessments of forestry effects on native bees

Milam

Cunningham‐Minnick

Roberts

et al. 2022

Conservat Sci and Prac

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Forest management is often practiced to enhance conditions for wildlife, including native bees. Evaluations of the effects of forest management on bees have shown that abundance and diversity are higher in newly created earlysuccessional conditions. To date, studies have restricted sampling to the forest understory; however, recent research finds that bee abundance is as high or higher in forest canopies than in understories, suggesting that previous observations of substantially greater bee abundance and diversity in recently managed areas could be an artifact of incomplete sampling of the vertical gradient within forests. To examine the potential implications of sampling biases associated with the failure of previous studies to include canopy samples in comparisons of managed and unmanaged forests, we sampled bees within a recently harvested forest as well as the understory and canopy of adjacent unmanaged forest. Bee abundance and diversity were an order of magnitude higher in managed areas compared to the unmanaged forest, even when understory and canopy samples were combined. These results suggest that not sampling the canopy is inconsequential with respect to the broadly reported conclusion that managed areas support more abundant and diverse bee communities than surrounding forest cover.

show abstract

“…We calculated percent occurrence for each of the 12 vegetation strata categories by dividing number of intersections by number of stops (25) and multiplying by 100. Hereafter, we interpreted percent occurrence as percent cover to be comparable with other studies (Lee et al 2021, Mathis et al 2021) and it is a more meaningful interpretation of the results. We also used a 10-factor basal area prism at the corners and center of the monitoring plot ( n = 5) to calculate site basal area.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 76%

“…We tallied individual flowers if < 20 flowers on a given stem and estimated to the nearest 10 if there were > 20 stems or flowers/stem (Mathis et al 2021). Floral abundance was calculated as total number of flowers during a single visit by the number of subplots completed during that visit (flowers/m 2 ; Lee et al 2021, Mathis et al 2021).…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Factors driving bumble bee (Hymenoptera: Apidae: Bombus) and butterfly (Lepidoptera: Rhopalocera) use of sheared shrubland and young forest communities of the western Great Lakes

Keele,

McNeil,

Duchamp

et al. 2023

Environmental Entomology

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

In the northern Great Lakes region, the creation and maintenance of early-successional woody communities as wildlife habitat have increasingly become a conservation priority. The extent to which insect pollinators use these systems remains largely anecdotal. In summer (June–August) of 2021, we surveyed 49 early-successional sites in the western Great Lakes region treated with either shrub-shearing or silviculture (young forest) for bumble bees, butterflies, and habitat components (i.e., structural vegetation and floral resources). Hierarchical distance models predicted pollinator densities (λ^) to be, on average, λ^ = 84 bumble bees/ha and λ^ = 102 butterflies/ha. Although sheared shrubland and young forest communities supported comparable densities of bumble bees and butterflies, density was not equal across all sites. At the microhabitat scale, butterfly density and morphospecies richness were negatively associated with tall shrub cover and butterfly morphospecies richness (but not density) was driven by floral richness. Similarly, bumble bee density was positively associated with metrics of floral resources, underscoring the importance of blooming plants within these woody systems. Landscape covariates explained variation in butterfly density/richness but not bumble bee density. Ultimately, our results demonstrate that blooming plant abundance is an important driver of bumble bee and butterfly densities within these managed early-successional communities. Because early-successional woody communities are dynamic and their herbaceous openings are ephemeral, routine management would ensure that a variety of successional conditions exist on the landscape to meet the needs of bumble bees, butterflies, and potentially other insect pollinators.

show abstract

Microhabitats created by log landings support abundant flowers and insect pollinators within regenerating mixed-oak stands in the Central Appalachian Mountains

Cited by 8 publications

References 63 publications

Bee diversity decreases rapidly with time since harvest in intensively managed conifer forests

Bee diversity decreases rapidly with time since harvest in intensively managed conifer forests

The contribution of canopy samples to assessments of forestry effects on native bees

Factors driving bumble bee (Hymenoptera: Apidae: Bombus) and butterfly (Lepidoptera: Rhopalocera) use of sheared shrubland and young forest communities of the western Great Lakes

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About