"Bees
are more diverse in desert areas and Utah has a lot of unique desert
areas," researcher Joseph Wilson said.
By
Nov. 8
(UPI) -- Utah is home to 660 bee species, according to a new study. One
out of every four bee species endemic to the United States can be found in the
aptly named Beehive State.
Thanks to
a four-year survey conducted by entomologists at Utah State University and the
U.S. Department of Agriculture, scientists have an improved understanding of
Utah's remarkable apian diversity.
Utah
hosts a variety of habitat and a diversity of flowers attractive to a wide
range of bee species.
"Bees
are more diverse in desert areas and Utah has a lot of unique desert areas,
with lots of elevational gradients between the deserts and adjacent
mountains," Utah State entomologist Joseph
Wilson told UPI. "Utah is also home to a diverse
flora, we have lots of different kinds of flowering plants, which can be linked
to the high bee diversity."
During
the survey, Wilson and his colleagues identified 49 new bee species.
Nearly
half of the bee species documented in the new paper -- published this
week in the journal PeerJ --
can be found in Utah's Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument, which was
established in 1996.
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