Many bee species, including rare species, are important for function of entire plant-pollinator networks.

ABSTRACT: It is important to understand how biodiversity, including that of rare species, affects ecosystem function. Here, we consider this question with regard to pollination. Studies of pollination function have typically focused on pollination of single plant species, or average pollination across plants, and typically find that pollination depends on a few common species. Here, we used data from 11 plant-bee visitation networks in New Jersey, USA, to ask whether the number of functionally important bee species changes as we consider function separately for each plant species in increasingly diverse plant communities. Using rarefaction analysis, we found the number of important bee species increased with the number of plant species. Overall, 2.5 to 7.6 times more bee species were important at th

SUBMITTER: Simpson DT 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC9006027 | biostudies-literature | 2022 Apr

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature