Is the Presence of Honeybees Having an Impact on Solitary Bee Species Abundance?

Hetita, Fatma Ramadan; S. El-Barbary, Nabil; A. Shebl, Mohamed; E. M. Esmaeil, Mohamed

doi:10.21608/asejaiqjsae.2023.334905

Is the Presence of Honeybees Having an Impact on Solitary Bee Species Abundance?

Document Type : Original Article

Authors

¹ Egypt, Alexandria University, Faculty of Agriculture

² Department of Applied Entomology & Zoology, Faculty of Agriculture, Alexandria University.

³ Department of Plant Protection, Faculty of Agriculture, Suez Canal University, Ismailia, 41522, Egypt.

⁴ Department of Applied Entomology & Zoology, Faculty of Agriculture, Alexandria University

10.21608/asejaiqjsae.2023.334905

Abstract

This work is considered as a first study in Western Egypt to evaluate the effect of honeybee presence on solitary bee species abundance, a case study of four crops in Alexandria Governorate at Al Hawaria region. Our results reported that the full blooming (mid-season) was more attractive to bees than the other blooming periods during different hours especially, at noon hours from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. in the two types of bees. In general, the visitation rates of insect pollinators were influenced by the blooming period of crops and the hours of the day. The competition between honeybees and solitary bees for floral resources was varied significantly between solitary bee species and from plant to another. However, the visitation rates of solitary bees to flowers of Egyptian clover were reached its peak in all study sites in the absence of honeybees. By analyzing the soil texture of the study area revealed that the soil texture is sandy loam which is most favorable for many ground- nesting bee species. Three different nest types were found in the study region, the first one in ground- nesting represented a nest of the tribe Anthophorinii, the second was in stem nesting bees of Xylocopa pubescens and the third type inside shell of a species of Osmia.

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