Reducing protected lands in a hotspot of bee biodiversity: bees of Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument

Abstract

Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument is a federally protected area found in central southern Utah. Designated in 1996 by President William J. Clinton, it was recently reduced in size by President Donald J. Trump in a proclamation that turned the one large monument into three smaller ones. A long-term, standardized study of the bees had been conducted from 2000–2003, revealing 660 species. The bee communities of the area are characterized by being spatially heterogeneous; most of the bees occur in isolated areas, with only a few being both abundant and widespread. Here we examine what affect the recent resizing of the monument has on the number, and ecology, of the bees now excluded from monument boundaries. Using the new monument boundaries and the geographic coordinates associated with each bee, we derived new species lists for each of the three monuments, and compared them to each other, and to the excluded lands. All three monuments now protect unique faunas, with Bray–Curtis similarity values not exceeding 0.59%. Each monument now harbors species not found in the other two monuments. We found that 84 bee species are no longer protected by any of the three monuments. These 84 species were not concentrated in one area that is now excluded, but were scattered throughout the newly excluded lands. For some of the excluded bee species, there is no evidence that they are rare or imperiled, being widespread throughout the west. However, there is a concentration of bees in the southern and eastern former monument lands that represent range extensions from nearby hot deserts. In addition to numerous range extensions, the list of excluded bees also contains several undescribed species (newly discovered species that have not yet been named and described by taxonomists) and morphospecies (individuals that are morphologically distinct, but that require additional research before species designations can be made). This indicates that the bee communities housed in these excluded areas would benefit from additional scientific inquiry. The areas now excluded from monument protections house a greater proportion of the original GSENM bee community than any of the three new monument units. We conclude this paper by discussing what the smaller monuments might mean for bee conservation in this hot spot of bee biodiversity and suggest that bee communities here and elsewhere should be taken into account when conservation decisions are being made.

Determining Timing of Births and Habitat Selection to Identify Lambing Period Habitat for Bighorn Sheep

“…Another important issue in southeastern Utah for which our GIS model can be used is in Grand Staircase-Escalante and Bears Ears national monuments. These areas are now being substantially reduced and opened for potential mining, livestock grazing, public access, and recreation (McBrayer and Roberts-Cady, 2018;Wilson et al, 2018;Reese, 2019). Timing of births data and a GIS model similar to ours could help inform natural resource managers about bighorn lambing period habitat in those areas facing immediate conservation and management changes.…”

Assessing Pollinator Friendliness of Plants and Designing Mixes to Restore Habitat for Bees

“…Federal agencies can play an essential role in restoring and conserving pollinators because federal agencies manage more than one-quarter of the land area, and most habitat types, in the United States. Federally managed lands include areas with the highest known bee species richness per square kilometer in the United States and are especially important for the conservation of bees (Koh et al 2016;Meiners et al 2019;Wilson et al 2018). Most public lands are managed, however, for a balanced combination of "outdoor recreation, range, timber, watershed, and wildlife and fish purposes" (Multiple Use and Sustained Yield Act, 1960), which can be a challenge for land managers to maintain and improve the health of public lands.…”

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

“…Changes in habitat caused by human activities (deforestation, fragmentation and loss of forests) impose environmental challenges for the survival of pollinator species and are the main drivers of the decline of pollinator populations (Ollerton, 2017;Wilson et al, 2018;Almeida et al, 2020). This important topic reminds us of the need to conserve natural habitats, since the pollination services performed by insects are not only essential to maintain Bees are the most important pollinating insects in the world, since they visit a large number of flowers daily in natural, agricultural and urban landscapes (Hausmann et al, 2016;Stein et al, 2017;Winfree et al, 2018), being exclusive pollinators of many botanical groups (Scaven & Rafferty, 2013;Venjakob et al, 2016), and indispensable in increasing the production of agricultural crops (Stein et al, 2017;Blettler et al, 2018;Winfree et al, 2018).…”

“…This important topic reminds us of the need to conserve natural habitats, since the pollination services performed by insects are not only essential to maintain Bees are the most important pollinating insects in the world, since they visit a large number of flowers daily in natural, agricultural and urban landscapes (Hausmann et al, 2016;Stein et al, 2017;Winfree et al, 2018), being exclusive pollinators of many botanical groups (Scaven & Rafferty, 2013;Venjakob et al, 2016), and indispensable in increasing the production of agricultural crops (Stein et al, 2017;Blettler et al, 2018;Winfree et al, 2018). However, these insects receive little recognition for their services when the issue is intensive land use, which are among the main causes of habitat loss and the consequent decline in the richness and abundance of bees (Stangler et al, 2016;Wilson et al, 2018;Almeida et al, 2020). The effects of environmental changes on bee species at different scales and geographic regions seem to be consistent (Ferreira et al, 2015;Alaux et al, 2017;Wilson et al, 2018).…”

“…However, these insects receive little recognition for their services when the issue is intensive land use, which are among the main causes of habitat loss and the consequent decline in the richness and abundance of bees (Stangler et al, 2016;Wilson et al, 2018;Almeida et al, 2020). The effects of environmental changes on bee species at different scales and geographic regions seem to be consistent (Ferreira et al, 2015;Alaux et al, 2017;Wilson et al, 2018). However, the effects of environmental changes on local landscapes cannot be excluded.…”