We just love the press that “Bees in the Six” is getting! The latest is “The Concrete Jungle is No Place for Bumblebees” written by Emily Deibert, a PhD student in the Department of Astronomy & Astrophysics at the University of Toronto.
What I really like about this article is the focus on understanding the implications of urban planning from a bumblebee’s perspective. For example, the tradeoff between foraging distance and colony success, or how different “green” spaces can be in offering suitable resources, like nesting habitat, nectar and pollen.
The article does offer a “bee-friendly plant species” resource to support a transition to a bee-friendly garden space, however, we would like to encourage people to consider locally native species. In the Greater Toronto Area, we suggest native Ontario species. Find out more about Ontario’s native species and purchase them here!
Congratulations to Amro Zayed! This afternoon, Amro is being recognized and celebrated during the York University Research Awards Celebration April 2022 as a Tier 2 York Research Chair in Genomics.
“Zayed’s research group sequences the genomes of thousands of bees to identify mutations that influence their economically and ecologically relevant traits to improve the health of Canadian honey bees.”
Cities are home to more than just huge populations of people and their altered environments. They can also sustain a large number of native and even at-risk species of bees and other wildlife. “Unfortunately, we currently lack research about specific features of urban environments that can enhance the fitness of pollinators.” – until now!
Genetic analysis of surveyed bees showed that dense infrastructure, like buildings, roads, and other paved surfaces, were associated with greater foraging distances for the the common eastern bumblebee (Bombus impatiens) – meaning that they need to fly further for food and can therefore dedicate less energy to raising young. Alternatively, the relative density of houses in Toronto was associated with shorter foraging distances, as they likely provide foraging opportunities in the absence of city parks and watershed forests.
Further, this analysis was unable to associate human income with either bumblebee foraging distance or colony density. Since no evidence of the “luxury effect” in Toronto was found, the benefits of pollination services along with opportunities to observe wild bumblebees and to engage in bumblebee conservation is not restricted to a subset of Toronto’s population.
“Our analysis suggests two simple strategies for improving bumblebee habitat within cities. First, conversion of paved surfaces to functional green space such as parks and meadows is likely to have a significant influence on the quality of pollinator habitats in Toronto. Second, … converting aesthetic green space (i.e., lawns…) into more functional natural green space (e.g., flowering meadows…) can improve the foraging opportunities of bumblebee colonies in Toronto.”
Conflitti et al., 2022
Southern Ontario native plants that would support wild bumblebees and be highly attractive to other native pollinators include: willow (Salix sp.), maple (Acer sp.), black-eyed Susan (Rudbeckia hirta), Canadian goldenrod (Solidago canadensis), New England aster (Symphyotrichum novae–angliae), and purple coneflower (Echinacea purpurea).
York University’s Centre for Bee Ecology, Evolution and Conservation, and the Packer Lab are hosting a monthly research series titled “Bee Biogeography and Systematics Talks“.
Kathleen Dogantzis, PhD Researcher in the Zayed Lab, will be diving into her research and interpreting the results on May 25, 2022 @ 11am EST. To find out more about the series and to register for upcoming events, please go to www.yorku.ca/bees/packer/
In addition to her research, Kathleen has also teamed up with Will Cuthbert, an art designer for a submission to the 2022 Winter Stations competition – And they won! Their installation is getting lots of attention, check out one article in Toronto Life. Congratulations Katie!
Congratulations to Amro Zayed for being awarded funding from the Canada Foundation for Innovation (CFI) for a research apiary to study honeybee behaviour, genetics and health. The funding will support Zayed by enhancing the capacity to experiment on honeybee colonies to support cutting-edge research on the genetics and health of these important pollinators. The research will lead to better understanding of honeybees and their role in supporting food security and sustainability.
Published on January 31 – Phenomic analysis of the honey bee pathogen-web and its dynamics on colony productivity, health and social immunity behaviors found that “colonies expressing high levels of three out of four of the social immunity behaviors studied (hygienic behavior, Varroa resistance behavior and grooming-related mite damage) were associated with low levels of pathogens/parasites, including viruses, Nosema spp., and mites.” This paper was in collaboration with Agriculture & Agri-Food Canada, University of Lethbridge, University of Manitoba, Université Laval, and University of British Columbia! Read this open access paper
We also just got word that “Bees in the six: Determinants of bumblebee habitat quality in urban landscapes” is now in press in Ecology and Evolution! This paper is co-authored by current and past Zayed Lab members Ida Conflitti, Mohammad Arshad Imrit, Bandele Morrison and in collaboration with Dr. Sheila R. Colla!
So thrilled to welcome a ‘tremendous’ trio of postdoctoral fellows to the group!
Dr. Bahar Patlar completed her doctorate on the evolutionary quantitive genetics of seminal fluid in flatworms in Bielefeld University, Germany and continued her seminal fluid research on fruit flies in Winnipeg. Can you guess what she will do here?
Dr. Syed Abbas Bukhari completed his PhD in informatics from the University of Illinois working on the genomics of social interactions in sticklebacks. He will be using genomics to study how multiple stressors ‘get under the skin’ of honey bees.
Dr. Sarah French competed her PhD in spatial ecology at the University of Toronto, studying the mechanisms that structure dragonfly communities. She will be studying how landscape and land use influence exposure to multiple stressors in honey bees.
Welcome Bahar, Abbas and Sarah! Can’t wait to see your diverse experiences and perspectives enrich the bee research realm!
Very happy to share this new paper from the lab on the evolutionary origin and adaptive radiation of the honey bee Apis mellifera.
Katie Dogantzis (PhD student in the lab) led this research with the help of several other current and former Zayed lab members, including Tanushree Tiwari (PhD student) and Ida Conflitti and Alivia Dey (Current and former Research Associates, respectively). The study also included collaboration with a large team of researchers from the US, Europe, Africa and Asia.
Big congrats to MSc Student KC Galang for winning the Entomological Society of Canada’s President Prize for best student talk in the area of Social Insects, for her talk titled “The molecular basis of altruistic and selfish aggression in honey bees”
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