Wild Bees of Bingham’s Wholesale Nursery

2017 Pollinator Profile: Wild Bees of Bingham’s Wholesale Nursery

Compiled by Jacob M. Cecala, Department of Entomology, UC Riverside

Wild bees are important pollinators of many plants in natural and agricultural areas. Certain ornamental plants, like those in nurseries, can attract wild bees and provide them with pollen and nectar.

In 2017 we sampled for bees at Bingham’s Wholesale Nursery located at 115 Viele, Beaumont, California, in summer using insect nets and blue vane traps. We collected 137 individual bees, representing 13 genera. This is just a sample, so there may be other genera not on this list.

List of Bee genera found at Bingham Wholesale Nursery in 2017.

Agapostemon

Lasioglossum

Apis

Halictus

Megachile

Melissodes

Bombus

Xylocopa

Xenoglssa

Augochlorella

Calliopsis

Hylaeus

Tetraloniella

You may be wondering:

How does this diversity compare to natural areas?

There are over 1,600 species of bees in 80 genera in all of California. We lack measurements of diversity at finer scales, but scientists estimate there are over 400 species in the vicinity of Riverside.

How does this diversity compare to other nurseries?

Since 2016, we have detected a total of 42 genera of bees across 13 nurseries in southern California. At any one given nursery, however, we find 13 to 23 over the course of one year.

Study Compiled by Jacob M. Cecala, The Wilson-Rankin Lab, Department of Entomology, UC Riverside