The Bee Report: The anniversary of our paper on the Bees of GSENM 🌵🐝
One year anniversary of our paper on the bees of Grand Staircase-Escalante
It was one year ago this week that Joe Wilson, Olivia Carril and I published our paper that explores how shrinking and carving up the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument in Utah might impact the incredible bee communities living there. We compared the results of Olivia and Joe's original bee collection in this hotspot of bee diversity with the plans to alter the boundaries of the monument. Here are some of the important things we discovered:
• 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 do individually.
• Each new monument unit now harbors species not found in either of the other two units.
• 84 bee species are no longer protected by any of the three units.
• The list of excluded bees contains several species and morphospecies that are still undescribed.
These findings raised lots of questions for us. And these questions are what took us back to the monument this past summer to continue studying the bees and create our documentary film.
When you have a chance, give the paper a read (it's open access). Our public lands have far more to offer than just the traditional pretty landscapes and postcard photo ops. They're places critical to protecting biodiversity and providing a reference point for the impact that human development is having on the world. And the bees of Grand Staircase-Escalante are a perfect example of why we need to protect these pristine, primitive places.
🗺 Joe Wilson 📷 Olivia Carril
Highlights
Here are a few stories that I found particularly interesting since the last newsletter. Thought you might be interested, too.
When stuck in water, bees create a wave and hydrofoil atop it
(Phys.org/California Institute of Technology) When a bee lands on water, the water sticks to its wings, robbing it of the ability to fly. However, that stickiness allows the bee to drag water, creating waves that propel it forward. The motion has never been documented in other insects and may represent a unique adaptation by bees. Editor: Check out the video of the bee in water.
Light pollution is key “bringer of insect apocalypse”
(The Guardian) “We strongly believe artificial light at night – in combination with habitat loss, chemical pollution, invasive species, and climate change – is driving insect declines,” the scientists concluded after assessing more than 150 studies. However, unlike other drivers of decline, light pollution is relatively easy to prevent by switching off unnecessary lights and using proper shades.
House panel advances bill to curb pesticides on wildlife refuges
(Bloomberg Environment) The Protect Our Refuges Act of 2019 (H.R. 2854) would reinstate a 2014 ban on the use of neonicotinoid insecticides in national wildlife refuges. The Trump administration’s Interior Department revoked the 2014 ban in August of 2018, citing the increased importance of genetically modified (GMO) seed crops, which often contain neonicotinoid seed coatings, for maintaining agricultural operations of wildlife preserves.
Conservation
What are roadsides good for except signs? Helping butterflies and bees
(Concord Monitor) New Hampshire has 5,000 miles of roads. Rights of way along all that mileage totals tens of thousands of acres, which isn’t used for much except road signs. But New Hampshire Fish and Game has received a $50,000 grant from the New England Forests and Rivers Fund, boosted by $50,000 in matching state funds and grants, in hopes of using roadsides and center areas to grow plants that support butterflies, bees and other pollen-eating insects.
Butterfly on a bomb range: Endangered Species Act at work
(AP) As a 400-pound explosive resounds in the distance, a tiny St. Francis Satyr butterfly flits among the splotchy leaves, ready to lay as many as 100 eggs. One of Earth’s rarest butterfly species, there are maybe 3,000 St. Francis Satyrs. There are never going to be enough of them to get off the endangered species list, but they’re not about to go extinct either—thanks in great measure to the 46-year-old federal act.
Policy/Law
Bill to protect Massachusetts pollinators advances
(Boston University News Service) One key feature of the bill is more restrictions on neonicotinoid use, especially by those who are not professionals. The bill also considers land and foraging space for native pollinators.
Willamette Valley prairie flower becomes Endangered Species Act success story
(Center for Biological Diversity) The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service proposed removing Bradshaw’s desert parsley, a wet prairie wildflower, from the list of endangered species this week due to the plant’s successful recovery. Insects observed to pollinate this plant include some small native bees.
Science
A little prairie can rescue honey bees from famine on the farm, study finds
(University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign) The researchers do not recommend that beekeepers move their hives to prairies. Remnant prairies are rare and too small for many hives, the researchers said. Overstocking with honey bees could negatively affect native bees. Instead, the team is testing an intervention that installs 5- to 8-acre strips of reconstructed prairie within or alongside agricultural fields.
Nectar is a sweet reward filled with toxic deterrents
(Bowdoin) Nectar, the sweet reward that entices bees to visit flowers, is a complex substance made up of several ingredients, including sucrose, fructose, amino acids, yeasts—and toxic compounds that normally deter insects from eating plants. One researcher is exploring this contradiction and what it might mean for the health of bees.
Neonicotinoids: despite EU moratorium, bees still at risk
(CNRS) Despite a 2013 moratorium on the use of neonicotinoids in the European Union, residues of these insecticides can still be detected in rape nectar from 48 percent of the plots studied, their concentrations varying greatly over the years. These findings indicate that persistent use of neonicotinoids with certain crops in open fields threatens bees and pollinators frequenting other, untreated crops; they confirm that residues remain and spread in the environment.
A century later, plant biodiversity struggles in wake of agricultural abandonment
(University of Minnesota) Researchers compared plots of abandoned farmland to nearby land that has not been significantly impacted by human activity. They found that one year after abandonment, the fields had, on average, 38 percent of the plant diversity and 34 percent of the plant productivity for the land that was never plowed; 91 years after abandonment, the fields still had only 73 percent of the plant diversity and 53 percent of the plant productivity.
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