Contrasting patterns of foraging behavior in neotropical stingless bees using pollen and honey metabarcoding.

ABSTRACT: Stingless bees are major flower visitors in the tropics, but their foraging preferences and behavior are still poorly understood. Studying stingless bee interactions with angiosperms is methodologically challenging due to the high tropical plant diversity and inaccessibility of upper canopy flowers in forested habitats. Pollen DNA metabarcoding offers an opportunity of assessing floral visitation efficiently and was applied here to understand stingless bee floral resources spectra and foraging behavior. We analyzed pollen and honey from nests of three distantly related stingless bee species, with different body size and social behavior: Melipona rufiventris, Scaptotrigona postica and Tetragonisca angustula. Simultaneously, we evaluate the local floristic components through seventeen rapid

SUBMITTER: Martins AC 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC10475120 | biostudies-literature | 2023 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature