Urban
bumblebees have better access to food, allowing them to produce more offspring
Wed
27 Jun 2018 00.01 BST
Bumblebee
colonies fare better in villages and cities than in fields, research has
revealed.
Bumblebees
are important pollinators, but face threats including habitat loss, climate
change, pesticide and fungicide use
and parasites.
Now researchers say that bumblebee colonies in urban areas not only produce
more offspring than those on agricultural land, but have more food stores,
fewer invasions from parasitic “cuckoo” bumblebees, and survive for longer.
“[The
study] is not saying that cities are necessarily the ideal habitat for bees, it
is just that they are doing better in the cities than in the countryside,” said
Ash Samuelson, a doctoral student and first author of the research from Royal
Holloway, University of London.
While
researchers have previously found a greater
variety of pollinator species in urban settings, Samuelson
says the latest study goes further, revealing that it is not simply that
bumblebees make a flying visit to urban locations, but that populations are
stronger there.
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