It has been a packed few days here in Phoenix, and I’d like to describe some of the presentations I saw at yesterday’s ground nesting bee symposium. There was a broad range of topics, including the microbe communities found on pollen balls, brood parasite and host interactions, rare desert bees, and more! Nick Dorian had great results to share from his mark-recapture work in New Jersey, which was great to see after he demonstrated that method to Team Echinacea over the summer. Lily Fulton’s presentation really stood out to me: She is also studying prescribed fire, at a long term experimental fire site in Florida longleaf pine flatwoods. they found higher bee and wasp abundances during burn years, as well as higher proportions of bare ground. This is strikingly similar to our research findings! It was great to chat with her about it over my own poster.
Title slide of Lily Fulton’s presentation. My poster! It is showing the first year of data from the ENRTF project, since we haven’t sent our 2024 bees to Zach yet.
It’s been incredible getting to meet so many researchers who care about native bees. Many stopped by to have a look at the poster! I’ve cited many of them in my previous work, so running into them in person is almost like meeting a celebrity. One consistent interest I’ve gotten from attendees is to look a the community composition of bees in the different treatment groups. Perhaps the increased abundance in the year of a burn we’re seeing is because of a cohort of burn-loving ground nesters, who don’t stick around in following years. It’ll be exciting to look into!
Shot of the poster sessions. There were a ton of applications, so space was pretty limited.
Overall, this has been a fantastic experience and opportunity to expand my network. I got to reconnect with some old friends, and make plenty of new ones. I can’t wait to get back to work on my thesis, now that I know who might be viewing it once it’s published! Expect more on that in the next few months.
A close up of an Agapostemon specimen with its tongue sticking out. The current collection of bees. Many more to come!
As of a few weeks ago, Emergence trapping for the ENRTF project is finished! It was a massive endeavor to complete, and I’m thankful for everyone on the team who pitched in. Now that our vials of bugs have been moved from Minnesota to Illinois, it’s time to start going through them to look for bees. It’s smelly work, but also a great opportunity to brush up on taxonomy and identification skills. We’re planning to hire a work-study student to help with pinning and data entry in the next few days. Until then, more for me!
NOTE: Funding for this project was provided by the Minnesota Environment and Natural Resources Trust Fund as recommended by the Legislative-Citizen Commission on Minnesota Resources (LCCMR).
This morning Team Echinacea was joined by special guest Steve Ellis, a commercial beekeeper based in Barrett, MN. Steve is also a national advocate for curbing the usage of neonicotinoid pesticides and has filed a lawsuit against the US EPA for sanctioning the widespread use of these chemicals in agriculture. While sipping on wild forage sumac-ade and devouring some delectable scones, the team was captivated by Steve’s description of the US pesticide regulatory system and the consequences of neonicotinoid usage. Neonicotinoids are a relatively new class of neuro-active insecticides used in agriculture throughout the US. Mounting evidence suggests these long-lived chemicals are at least partly responsible for the precipitous decline of commercial honeybee populations over the past 20 years. However, less is known about how neonicotinoids affect native pollinators, the birds and mammals that feed on pesticide-ridden insects, and the aquatic systems where neonicotinoids accumulate.
In other news, we finished measuring P1 before returning to the Hjelm House to celebrate Keaton’s birthday with cake and “exercises in estimation.”
The field season is heating up for Team Echinacea both literally and metaphorically. Much of the metaphorical heat comes from the awesome work everyone has been putting into group and independent projects. However, a small portion of this heat also comes from a budding relationship between Andrea and I that was sparked at experimental plot 2 a week ago. On my day off, I missed her so much I simply had to draw a picture of her.
Why is Andrea so special to me? One important reason is that she is an Andrena bee and Andrena seem to be the most efficient pollinators of Echinacea angustifolia based on our preliminary findings. Another reason is that she is absolutely adorable and very photogenic.
Aside from missing Andrea, I also made dinner for the team. I decided on sweet potato black bean tacos with homemade tortillas. Mmmm…..
