The bee issue. All about bees this week!
An interview with a grad student studying grassland bees + flower of the week
I don’t know nearly enough about bees. Sadly, I’m not alone: insects remain understudied despite signs of large-scale declines. To begin climbing the mountain of my ignorance, I dropped a line to my friend Courtney Burson, a master’s student at the University of Nebraska Omaha, where I also got my M.S. in biology. She studies bee ecology and conservation at Glacier Creek Preserve, a restored and carefully managed grassland outside of Omaha.
Conor: I think to a lot of people, a bee is a bee. Or a stinging insect (wasp, hornet, bee) is a stinging insect and they just want it to go away. But there’s diversity in the bee world, of course. In your study area for your master’s research, what’s the bee community like?
Courtney: I focus on grassland bees in eastern Nebraska. Unfortunately, Nebraska does not have a master bee list so it's difficult to say which bees are where. The Xerces Society has a list of bumblebees (genus Bombus) and the counties they have been found in. My study site has quite a few Lasioglossum (sweat bees), Melissodes, Bombus, Halictus, & Augochlorella. There are seven families worldwide. My study site has five families: Apidae (the largest family), Halictidae (sweat bees), Colletidae (plasterer bees), Megachilidae (mostly solitary bees), and Andrenidae (mining bees). I found only two cleptoparasitic or “cuckoo” bees (bees that lay eggs in other species' nests) and one honey bee (which is a good thing, since they are a non-native species that can spread disease to native bees). There are flower specialists and generalists. Most of the bee species I caught nest underground, with a few stem nesters. Bombus is a social species & most of the rest are solitary, although some do aggregate and one can be either social or solitary. I am happy to report that I caught an endangered bee (on the IUCN's red list; Bombus fraternus) and a vulnerable bee (IUCN's red list; Bombus pensylvanicus).
Conor: I didn’t even know some bees nested inside of plant stems!
You had a specific focus on how bees respond to fire in a grassland. First of all, what’s the fire management situation on your research plots? What have you found so far about how bees respond, as a community and as individual species?
Courtney: My research is based in a restored (primarily) tallgrass prairie. Fire management is rotated where the different sites get burned about every three years. My research took place in summer 2018 and my sites had burn times of: May 2016, May 2017, May 2018, & May 2017/May 2018. This last place was an accident—the burners lost control of the fire and it burnt an area that had been burned the previous area.
Bees that nest underground usually do okay with fires—adults can flee and the nests are same underground. Cavity nesters usually get impacted by the fires, as the larvae/eggs die in the fire. Individual species seem to have a preference for time since last burn, but this is probably due to the types of flowers available.
Conor: Can you explain a little what you mean that individual species have a preference for time since burn? Do you mean that some species show up more in recently burned plots, and others in less recently burned plots? And you're saying that certain flowers are more likely to be in recently burned vs. less recently burned plots?
Courtney: Yes, that’s exactly what I mean. It also is going to involve nesting style, as stem nesters are more likely to die in the fire (so recently burned areas are going to have fewer stem nesters).
Conor: Why is it important to know how fire affects bees in grasslands?
Courtney: Bees are important pollinators and their numbers are declining. Understanding how bees react to fire can help land managers make choices about conserving/restoring land for bees.
Conor: Do you make any management recommendations when you give talks, or are you focused on describing what's going on rather than making recommendations? Often, grassland bird researchers will recommend patch-burn grazing or some kind of management that leads to "patchiness" and variety at a site. Is that also good for bees?
Courtney: If someone asks, I'll make a recommendation, but I feel like I don't know enough about land management to make recommendations unless it's asked for. However, the research I am doing now and any research in the future is practical and based around conservation/restoration. Patchiness usually creates diversity, which as you know is thought to be good for most organisms. Plus patchy burn times = variety in flowers, which is good for generalists. The patchiness since burn time probably doesn't matter for plots that are over five years old (based off a few studies with sites that were 3,5,12,15, 50+ times since last burn).
Conor: Is there anything that’s been a challenge about studying bees? As a bird biologist, I cluelessly think, “they’re so little!”
Courtney: They can be extremely difficult to ID. I had to have my bees IDed by a professional, and there were bees that she wasn't able to get down to specific-epithet (mostly Lasioglossum). Unfortunately, my research required me to physically capture the specimens. This was particularly difficult for me mentally. Preservation can be tricky as well. I made a rookie mistake that resulted in some poor quality specimens that made identification a bit difficult.
Conor: Favorite story to tell about field work?
Courtney: I lost my keys in a field and had to be back at UNO to teach later that day. Did not make it to say the least. About a week later I lost my brand new phone out there. Thankfully I used "find my iPhone" and was able to track it down.
Conor: Once I’ve dropped something in tallgrass, I usually assume it’s gone forever, so I’m glad to hear there was a happy ending for your phone.
As you move towards the end of your master’s program, do you have any thoughts/feelings about the ecology grad school experience? Things you liked, things you didn’t as much?
Courtney: I love school and hope to never leave! Being at school all day everyday was heavenly for me. My advisor is extremely flexible and had no issues with me studying insects—even though neither of us at the time had a strong background in them.
Things I didn't like as much: I wish I had a more concrete idea of what I wanted to do. I had lots of ideas and as a result I put off a lot of things (like applying for grants) and it stressed me out. I added another part to my study (on bee genetics) about halfway through my field season. I also don't really like writing for grants or proposals/ thesis. Nor do I like the idea of going after grants. I understand why, but I wish I lived in a world where science & research was super well funded and there was money for everyone.
Conor: You can say that again!
Do you have a favorite bee species?
Courtney: I do not, surprisingly. All bees are amazing and I'm constantly being surprised by them. Bumblebees are so cute and easy to notice, but sweat bees (metallic) are beautiful … Cuckoo bees have really cool lifestyles.
They are all my favorite—all 20,000 of them.
Thanks for your time, and good luck with the bees, Courtney! I hope everyone can follow your lead and take a look at their local bee diversity this summer. If you’re a bee amateur like me, iNaturalist can be a huge help for ID.
Check out #InverteFest on Twitter this week!
Flower of the week: Lesser burdock
Lesser burdock (Arctium minus) is introduced from Eurasia and produces one of the many types of spiky burs that hikers find clinging to their shoelaces. The burs make them highly effective at spreading to new open areas. In their native range they have a history of medicinal uses; many parts of the plant are edible (though similar-looking species are not, so be careful.) Like many introduced plants, while not ideal, they’re not without use to native wildlife:
This Common Eastern Bumblebee (Bombus impatiens) was just one of many pollinators I saw in a burdock patch along the fence-line of our nearby ballfields. Courtney, look, I found a bee!
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Possum Notes is a weekly newsletter about wildlife and landscapes around where I live. It’s produced on occupied Massachusett and Wampanoag land.