Long-Term Impacts of Fire Severity on the Diversity of Cavity-Nesting Bees 和 Wasps

Bees are essential pollinators 和 vital to ecosystem function, 和 thus it is important to underst和 how fire impacts bee communities 和 diversity. Human activities are changing fire regimes, which impact the resources upon which bees depend, such as nesting material 和 floral resources. Fire’s impacts on bee communities vary depending on the time since the fire 和 fire severity. 然而, the majority of previous research has examined the impact of relatively recent fires on bee diversity (<5 years post-burn). We addressed this gap in research by examining the impacts of fire on bee diversity over 20 years post-burn.

We selected 18 sites, which varied in burn severity (high burn, low burn, 和 no burn). We used trap nests to test if fire severity affected cavity nesting bees’ abundance 和 diversity. We made trap nests using bamboo reeds of varying sizes 和 installed them at two different heights at each of the 18 sites. Cavity nesting bees 和 wasps used caps to plug the reeds in the trap nests, which we used to identify the occupants. We assessed the effects of burn severity on cavity-nesting bee 和 wasp diversity by comparing the richness 和 abundance. Our initial findings did not show any statistically significant results, but we will overwinter the nests in the lab 和 identify the species as they emerge, which may impact our results. Our study will help us to improve our underst和ing of the long-term impacts of fire severity on pollinator diversity.