Jordi Bosch

CREAF, Autonomous University of Barcelona

In agricultural ecosystems, bees are exposed to combinations of pesticides that may have been applied at different times. For example, bees visiting a flowering crop may be chronically exposed to low concentrations of systemic insecticides applied before bloom and then to a pulse of fungicide, considered safe for bees, applied during bloom. In this...

Differences in pollination effectiveness (PE) among pollinators have been widely documented. However, the morphological and behavioural traits underlying these differences have been less investigated. We used single-visit pollen deposition to apple flowers to explore the relationship between pollinator traits and PE. Our objectives were to determin...

The recent EU ban of the three most widely used neonicotinoids (imidacloprid, thiamethoxam and clothianidin) to all outdoors applications has stimulated the introduction of new insecticides into the market. Sulfoxaflor is a new systemic insecticide that, like neonicotinoids, acts as a modulator of nicotinic acetylcholine receptors. In agro-environm...

Climate, landscape composition, management practice, and wild bee pollination are all variables thought to play significant roles in commercial apple production. However, how these variables affect production efficiency under field-realistic conditions has not been investigated at large geographical scales. We combined intensive standardized field...

We report on the discovery of the spider-hunting wasp Trypoxylon petiolatum (Crabronidae) nesting in three localities in the Province of Girona (Catalonia, NE Spain) in 2019 and 2021. This species is native to eastern Asia and has not previously been reported from Europe. We provide a detailed description of the species, as well as information on i...

Larger geographical areas contain more species—an observation raised to a law in ecology. Less explored is whether biodiversity changes are accompanied by a modification of interaction networks. We use data from 32 spatial interaction networks from different ecosystems to analyse how network structure changes with area. We find that basic community...

A plain langauge 2 page overview of the paper "Opportunities to reduce pollination deficits and address production shortfalls in an important insect-pollinated crop" designed for non-acedemic audiences (or very busy acedemics). Please feel free to pass this along.

Functional traits mediate the response of communities to disturbances (response traits) and their contribution to ecosystem functions (effect traits). To predict how anthropogenic disturbances influence ecosystem services requires a dual approach including both trait concepts. Here, we use a response‐effect trait conceptual framework to understand...

Cultivation of pollinator-dependent crops has expanded globally, increasing our reliance on insect pollination. This essential ecosystem service is provided by a wide range of managed and wild pollinators whose abundance and diversity are thought to be in decline, threatening sustainable food production. The Western honey bee (Apis mellifera) is am...

Some species of two tribes (Anthidiini and Osmiini) of the bee family Megachilidae utilize empty gastropod shells as nesting cavities. While snail-nesting Osmiini have been more frequently studied and the nesting biology of several species is well-known, much less is known about the habits of snail-nesting Anthidiini. We collected nests of four spe...

Pollinators face multiple pressures and there is evidence of populations in decline. As demand for insect‐pollinated crops increases, crop production is threatened by shortfalls in pollination services. Understanding the extent of current yield deficits due to pollination and identifying opportunities to protect or improve crop yield and quality th...

The sulfoximine insecticide sulfoxaflor is regarded as a potential substitute for neonicotinoids that were recently banned in the EU due to their side effects on bees. Like neonicotinoids, sulfoxaflor acts as a competitive modulator of nicotinic acetylcholine receptors. In agricultural environments, bees are commonly exposed to combinations of pest...

https://www.uab.cat/web/detalle-noticia/los-cambios-en-la-composicion-de-las-plantas-alteran-las-comunidades-de-polinizadores-y-la-polinizacion-1345680342040.html?noticiaid=1345830959700

Osmia spp. are excellent orchard pollinators but evidence that their populations can be sustained in orchard environments and their use results in increased fruit production is scarce. We released an Osmia cornuta population in an almond orchard and measured its population dynamics, as well as visitation rates and fruit set at increasing distances...

Ecological communities are dynamic entities subjected to extinction/colonization events. Because species are connected through complex interaction networks, the arrival of a new species is likely to affect various species across the community, as observed in plant biological invasions. However, plant invasions usually represent extreme scenarios in...

Around thirty species of European solitary bee species in the family Megachilidae nest in empty gastropod shells. We surveyed this group of bees in semi-natural sites adjacent to almond orchards near Lleida (north-eastern Spain) and collected 35 Hoplitis fertoni and 58 Osmia ferruginea nests in shells of six snail species. We describe the nest stru...

Solitary bees are frequently exposed to pesticides, which are considered as one of the main stress factors that may lead to population declines. A strong immune defence is vital for the fitness of bees. However, the immune system can be weakened by environmental factors that may render bees more vulnerable to parasites and pathogens. Here we demons...

Abstract Species assemblages and their interactions vary through space, generating diversity patterns at different spatial scales. Here, we study the local‐scale spatial variation of a cavity‐nesting bee and wasp community (hosts), their nest associates (parasitoids), and the resulting antagonistic network over a continuous and homogeneous habitat....

Abstract Hairiness is a salient trait of insect pollinators that has been linked to thermoregulation, pollen uptake and transportation, and pollination success. Despite its potential importance in pollination ecology, hairiness is rarely included in pollinator trait analyses. This is likely due to the lack of standardized and efficient methods to m...

Understanding how ecological networks are assembled is important because network structure reflects ecosystem functioning and stability. Quantitative network analysis incorporates measures of interaction strength as an estimate of the magnitude of the effect of interaction partners on one another. Most plant-pollinator network studies use frequency...

Neonicotinoid insecticides have been signaled as an important driver of widespread declines in bee diversity and abundance. Neonicotinoids were registered in the 1990s and by 2010 accounted for one third of the global insecticide market. Following a moratorium in 2013, their use on open-field crops was completely banned in the EU in 2018. Pesticide...

Pesticide use is one of the main causes of pollinator declines in agricultural ecosystems. Traditionally, most laboratory studies on bee ecotoxicology test acute exposure to single compounds. However, under field conditions, bees are often chronically exposed to a variety of chemicals, with potential synergistic effects. We studied the effects of f...

Significance Agricultural landscape homogenization is a major ongoing threat to biodiversity and the delivery of key ecosystem services for human well-being. It is well known that increasing the amount of seminatural cover in agricultural landscapes has a positive effect on biodiversity. However, little is known about the role of the crop mosaic it...

Large‐scale spatial variability in plant‐pollinator communities (e.g., along geographic gradients, across different landscapes) is relatively well understood. However, we know much less about how these communities vary at small scales within a uniform landscape. Plants are sessile and highly sensitive to microhabitat conditions, whereas pollinators...

A pesar de que España es uno de los países con mayor diversidad de polinizadores silvestres y, que de su conservación depende el futuro de nuestros cultivos y por tanto de nuestra alimentación, lo cierto es que hoy día seguimos sin conocer el estado de conservación de gran parte de esta fauna, una demanda histórica de la sociedad cien- tífica que s...

Local agri-environmental schemes, including hedgerows, flowering strips, organic management, and a landscape rich in semi-natural habitat patches, are assumed to enhance the presence of beneficial arthropods and their contribution to biological control in fruit crops. We studied the influence of local factors (orchard management and adjacent habita...

Current pesticide risk assessment for bees relies on a single (social) species, the western honey bee, Apis mellifera L. (Hymenoptera: Apidae). However, most of the >20,000 bee species worldwide are solitary. Differences in life history traits between solitary bees (SB) and honey bees (HB) are likely to determine differences in routes and levels of...

1. Apple is considered the most important fruit crop in temperate areas and profit-able production depends on multiple ecosystem services, including the reduction of pest damage and the provision of sufficient pollination levels. Management ap-proaches present an inherent trade-off as each affects species differently. 2. We quantified the direct a...

Ecological communities are composed of species that interact with each other forming complex interaction networks. Although interaction networks have been usually treated as static entities, interactions show high levels of temporal variation, mainly due to temporal species turnover. Changes in taxonomic composition are likely to bring about change...

Variable transformations used in analyses. (DOC)

Functional trait descriptions. (PDF)

Functional traits for each host species and literature source. (PDF)

Functional traits for each parasitoid species and literature source. (PDF)

Host and parasitoid species and their code numbers in Figs 1 and 2. (DOC)

Biweekly fluctuations in percent parasitism. Mean percent parasitism for each fortnight (computing percent parasitism in each plot for each fortnight and then computing mean value considering all plots for each fortnight). (TIF)

Organic management, connective woody habitats, and landscape complexity are supposed to enhance beneficial arthropods and biological pest control in agro-ecosystems. We studied earwigs (Dermaptera: Forficulidae) as generalist predators and aphids (Hemiptera: Aphididae) as key pests serving as earwig prey in a total of 58 commercial apple orchards d...

Pollinators in agroecosystems are often exposed to pesticide mixtures. Even at low concentrations, the effects of these mixtures on bee populations are difficult to predict due to potential synergistic interactions. In this paper, we orally exposed newly emerged females of the solitary beeOsmia bicornis to environmentally realistic levels of clothi...

Agricultural intensification is one of the main causes for the current biodiversity crisis. While reversing habitat loss on agricultural land is challenging, increasing the farmland configurational heterogeneity (higher field border density) and farmland compositional heterogeneity (higher crop diversity) has been proposed to counteract some habita...

Species flower production and flowering phenology vary from year to year due to extrinsic factors. Inter-annual variability in flowering patterns may have important consequences for attractiveness to pollinators, and ultimately, plant reproductive output. To understand the consequences of flowering pattern variability, a community approach is neces...

Non-metric multidimensional scaling (NMDS) analysis describing yearly and monthly variation in nectar composition. Ellipses correspond to standard deviations of the sampling events of each grouping factor (years or months). 1: March; 2: April; 3: May; 4: June. Points on figure (A) represents transect–year values. Points on figure (B) represents eac...

Mean nectar and pollen production per flower. (PDF)

Descriptive statistics of flower density, flowering peak and flowering duration of the 23 main plant species of the Garraf community. Species ordered by timing of flowering peak. (PDF)

Results of analyses exploring phylogenetic (Bloomberg’s K test) constraints on flowering pattern variability. (PDF)

Database used in the analyses. (ZIP)

The isolation by distance model (IBD) predicts that genetic differentiation among populations increases with geographic distance. Yet, empirical studies show that a variety of ecological, topographic, and historical factors may override the effect of geographic distance on genetic variation. This may particularly apply to species with narrow but hi...

Most of the world’s wild flowering plants (87.5%) are pollinated by insects and other animals (established but incomplete), more than three quarters of the leading types of global food crops can benefit, at least in part, from animal pollination (well established) and it is estimated that about one-third of global food volume produced similarly ben...

Bergmann's rule originally described a positive relationship between body size and latitude in warm-blooded animals. Larger animals, with a smaller surface/volume ratio, are better enabled to conserve heat in cooler climates (thermoregulatory hypothesis). Studies on endothermic vertebrates have provided support for Bergmann's rule, whereas studies...

Background: Neonicotinoid insecticides have been identified as an important factor contributing to bee diversity declines. Nonetheless, uncertainties remain about their impact under field conditions. Most studies have been conducted on Apis mellifera and tested single compounds. However, in agricultural environments, bees are often exposed to mult...

Natural and semi-natural habitats within agricultural landscapes provide food and nesting resources for wild bees, thus promoting crop pollination services. In central Spain, a large network of drove roads (DRs) crosses extensive areas of intensive agricultural fields. DRs are tracks (20–75 m wide) with semi-natural vegetation, protected for their...

Background and aims: Colour is one of the main floral traits used by pollinators to locate flowers. Although pollinators show innate colour preferences, the view that the colour of a flower may be considered an important predictor of its main pollinators is highly controversial because flower choice is highly context-dependent, and initial innate...

1. Diapause is a dynamic process of low metabolic activity that allows insects to survive periods of harsh conditions. Notwithstanding the lowered metabolism, and because diapausing insects have no access to food, diapause has an energetic cost that may affect post-diapause performance. 2. Previous studies on the solitary bee Osmia lignaria have sh...

There is uncertainty regarding the extent to which the use of honey bees can serve as surrogates for non-Apis pollinator species in the risk assessment for plant protection products. In the European Union solitary bees are protected by a specific risk assessment scheme (EFSA, 2013), although validated testing methodologies are currently not availa...

Due to the contribution of honey bees (Apis mellifera) to wild flower and crop pollination, beekeeping has traditionally been considered a sustainable practice. However, high honey bee densities may have an impact on local pollen and nectar availability, which in turn may negatively affect other pollinators. This is exacerbated by the ability of ho...

For bees, many roads lead to social harmony Eusociality, where workers sacrifice their reproductive rights to support the colony, has evolved repeatedly and represents the most evolved form of social evolution in insects. Kapheim et al. looked across the genomes of 10 bee species with varying degrees of sociality to determine the underlying genomic...

The evolution of eusociality is one of the major transitions in evolution, but the underlying genomic changes are unknown. We compared the genomes of ten bee species that vary in social complexity, representing multiple independent transitions in social evolution, and report three major findings. First, many important genes show evidence of neutral...

Poor pollination is a common cause of low fruit set in cherry orchards, and a high population of pollinators is therefore required. Osmia lignaria, the blue orchard bee, has been used successfully in Utah as an alternative to honey bees.

Land-use driven habitat modification is a major driver of biodiversity loss and impoverishment of interaction diversity. This may affect ecosystem services such as pollination and biological control. Our objective is to analyze the effects of local (nesting environment: farms vs. tree stands) and landscape (forest-cropland gradient) factors on the...

Insect diapause (dormancy) synchronizes an insect's life cycle to seasonal changes in the abiotic and biotic resources required for development and reproduction. Transcription analysis of diapause to post-diapause quiescent transition in the alfalfa leafcutting bee Megachile rotundata Fabricius identifies 643 post-diapause up-regulated gene transcr...

Geographic variation in reproductive output determines plant distribution. In this study, we investigate the geographic structure and the factors affecting reproductive success throughout the life cycle of the near-threatened crucifer Erysimum popovii across its entire distribution range. We worked in 21 populations, in which we measured fruit set,...

There is uncertainty regarding the extent to which the use of honey bees can serve as surrogates for non-Apis pollinator species in the risk assessment for plant protection products. In the EFSA Bee Guidance Document (2013), solitary bees are protected by a specific risk assessment scheme, although validated testing methodologies are currently not...

Gynodioecy is a dimorphic breeding system in which female individuals coexist with hermaphroditic individuals in the same population. Females only contribute to the next generation via ovules, and many studies have shown that they are usually less attractive than hermaphrodites to pollinators. Several mechanisms have been proposed to explain how fe...