Farming for bees: annual variation in pollinator populations across agricultural landscapes

Wild bees comprise a diverse group of pollinators essential to healthy ecosystems and crop pollination. Despite their importance, the way in which many driving factors affect specific bees or pollinators in specific regions remains unknown. Northern New England is one such place lacking detailed study. Accordingly, we collected bees from three different landscape types for three consecutive years in northern New England. Annual, seasonal and landscape factor affects were examined. We found that season and landscape type significantly influenced the bee community. Bee abundance and species richness were highest during the warmer seasons. At the landscape scale, overall bee abundance and species richness were greatest in the organic farm landscapes and lowest in the meadow landscapes. We also examined the bee community across multiple taxonomic levels: guild, family and species. Wild bee abundance varied significantly depending on the taxonomic level analyzed. Within genera, certain species had significantly higher abundances in meadow type landscapes, whereas other species had higher abundances in the organic or the conventional farm type landscapes. These results support the need for more regionally and taxonomically specific studies on wild bees, their habitat requirements and the influence of environmental factors across agricultural and unmanaged landscapes.