A little bee told me… using waggle dance analysis and pollen identification to examine foraging of honey bees (Apis mellifera) in mixed agro-urban ecosysems

Honey bees (Apis mellifera) are generalist foragers that are crucial to the pollination of several economically important crops in the US Midwest, an area characterized largely of low-diversity conventional agriculture. However, in the same area exists both diversified farms with more than one crop, and urban space with pollinator gardens and roadside with uncultivated plants not intentionally planted by humans. At one apiary in central Illinois with availability of forage at all three landscapes, it is unclear where honey bees would be present. To explore this, I used waggle dance analysis combining Image J, R, and QGIS to create maps representing honey bee presence in August 2021 and 2022, a period where summer forage beings to dwindle and bees begin to shift foraging. This was paired with identification of corbicular pollen further confirm honey bee forage. From corbicular pollen, 51% of pollen came from plants introduced to the Midwest; further, one-third of these plants are legally identified as invasive or noxious weeds. Waggle dance maps reveal bee presence in urban areas or roadsides with predominantly uncultivated plants such as Cichorium intybus or Trifolium spp. Though additional work needs to be done, this contrasts with current pollinator-friendly planting recommendations that predominantly or solely consist of plants native to the Midwest. This study suggests honey bees may instead benefit from certain plants introduced to the landscape, such as food plants intentionally cultivated in diversified farms or backyard gardens. A mixed planting of native and cultivated plants to support both honey and native bees could support both while potentially allowing for climate resiliency.

Name thesis:degree_name

M.S.

Level thesis:degree_level

Thesis

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Entomology

Grantor

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Year dc:date

2024

Author dc:creator

• Suresh, Sreelakshmi

Contributors dc:contributor

• Dolezal, Adam
• Ngumbi, Esther N
• Molano-Flores, Brenda

• Honey Bee Foraging
• Waggle Dance Language
• Honey Bee
• Pollinator
• Palynology
• Pollen

Statement dc:rights

• Copyright 2024 Sreelakshmi Suresh

Language dc:language

en, eng

Handle dc:identifier

https://hdl.handle.net/2142/124420

OAI record oai:identifier

https://www.ideals.illinois.edu/oai-pmh?verb=GetRecord&metadataPrefix=etdms&identifier=oai%3Awww.ideals.illinois.edu%3A2142%2F124420