Sandpits provide critical refuge for bees and wasps (Hymenoptera: Apocrita)

Abstract

Evidence-based conservation allows the evaluation of both the collateral benefits and the drawbacks of a wide range of human activities, like quarrying. In this study, the community structure of bees and wasps (Hymenoptera:Apocrita) in Central European sandpits was investigated, focusing on the changes caused by quarrying cessation and technical reclamation, as well as on the changes caused by spontaneous succession leading to the increased availability of food resources but also to the loss of the number and size of available bare sand patches. The bees and wasps demonstrated an exceptional ability to colonize the newly emerging sand quarrying areas, and to survive in them unless these were quarried as intensively as to not allow the development of any early successional vegetation. Both active and closed sandpits were found to serve as important regional refuges for the persistence of many rare species. In total, 221 species were detected, 53 of those were red-listed, with two species thought to be regionally extinct. Typically, active quarrying was associated with the presence of Bembecinus tridens, Halictus subauratus, H. maculatus, and Andrena nigroaenea. The list of the species of conservation interest is provided, and so is the detailed analysis of the life-history traits of the species in relation to the presence of bare sand patches, vegetation cover, quarrying intensity, and time elapsed since the formation of each artificial habitat patch. Sandpits as refuges for xerothermophilous and psammophilous hymenopterans are usually completely and irreversibly lost if the current legislature enforcing the technical reclamation over spontaneous or assisted succession is applied in all or most of the post-mining areas.

Industrial and post-industrial habitats serve as critical refugia for pioneer species of newly identified arthropod assemblages associated with reed galls

“…Thus, the situation does not resemble the previously reported species succession gradients of aculeate hymenopterans, vascular plants and some other taxa at early successional stages of dry post-quarrying and postmining sites (cf. Heneberg et al 2013;Prach et al 2013). Our data confirmed previous conclusions of other large biodiversity assessments conducted in other habitats, such as grasslands (Allan et al 2014;Manning et al 2015), heathlands (Cameron and Leather 2012), mosaic temperate landscapes (Duelli and Obrist 1998;Oertli et al 2005), or tropical forests (Lawton et al 1998), showing that the higher land use intensity substantially alters the study environment, affecting differentially the trophically diverse taxa.…”

How can we restore biodiversity and ecosystem services in mining and industrial sites?

“…Besides the principally perceived negative environmental impacts of mining and industrial sites, post-mining and post-industrial sites are not only negative products of human disturbances. They may provide refugia for specialized wildlife (Prach et al 2011;Heneberg et al 2013;Mata et al 2016;Řehounková et al 2016;Tropek et al 2015). Unless mining and other industrial activities destroy valuable sites with high natural, historical, or aesthetic value, they may increase, under certain conditions, biodiversity and geodiversity of a landscape.…”

Burrowing bird's decline driven by EIA over-use

“…The results of this study necessitate the consideration of evidence-based conservation data when preparing new environmental regulations. Well-intentioned regulations should better reflect the reality of the cultural landscape -EIA assessment has been shown to nearly completely abolish nature-friendly small-scale quarrying businesses with their associated biota not limited to the sand martins only (Lenda et al, 2012;Heneberg et al, 2013) (Fig. 1).…”