Nesting Preferences of Osmia Bees in the Rocky Mountains
Abstract
Osmia is a genus of solitary, cavity-nesting bees which will readily nest in artificial nest- blocks. Nest-blocks (or “trap-nests”) have long been used to study cavity-nesting bees and have recently been popularized for conserving bees in urban and agricultural systems. What attributes of the nest-block, its placement, and its proximal environment are attractive to Osmia? At each of several existing sites with nest-blocks already set up in the Rocky Mountains, CO, I measured the orientation and height of each nest-block; the health, circumference, and color of each tree with a nest-block; and the internal temperature of each nest-block. Osmia preferred warmer nest-blocks and blocks on larger trees, but there was no observed effect of any other variable on the number of nesting Osmia iridis. Future research should focus on measuring internal nest temperature for longer periods of time and placing nest-blocks on a wider variety of tree circumferences.
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References (29)
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