Assessing the impacts of long-term pan trapping on native bee populations in sub-alpine ecosystems

Abstract

Pollination by native bees is an essential ecosystem service in both natural and agricultural systems. During the last several decades, there have been reported declines in native bee populations worldwide. Due to recent declines, there is an increasing need for standardized population monitoring programs worldwide. The standardized method of monitoring bee populations is the use of pan traps, which destructively sample bees by removing them from the ecosystem. Very little investigation has been done to date into the long-term impacts of using pan traps on native bee populations. This study tries to assess whether long-term use of pan traps has a negative impact on bee populations in sub-alpine ecosystems in the Colorado Rocky Mountains. Our results suggest that repeated, long-term sampling for bees does not affect bee abundance. However, due to an unexpected but marginally significant difference in bee abundance between the three valleys where samples were taken, our results should be interpreted cautiously. Further investigation is required to understand the impacts of these monitoring

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