Calibrating the data logger…
To predict the number of individuals of a species that are active on a landscape, it is important to understand how species? abundances change throughout a season ? we call this the phenological abundance curve. The shape of solitary bees? phenological curves are unknown, which often limits the scope of our studies to the community level. This makes it challenging to determine how factors such as climate change are affecting bee emergence phenology. This gap in knowledge is due to limits in how frequently we can sample bee destructively without affecting the very populations that we want to study. To address this gap, I will gather fine-scale time-series data on the abundance of three native, solitary bee species that are found around the RMBL. By marking bees of these species that can be identified in the field with a non-toxic paint, I will be able to overcome the challenge of measuring their populations without affecting them. I will then use these data to develop a mechanistic model to describe how emergence and mortality rates interact to shape bees? seasonal abundances. Further, I will measure how bees? foraging decisions and habitat preferences vary across space in order to more accurately estimate bee abundance. This work will allow us to examine the population dynamics and phenological responses to climate change of bee species beyond the three that are the focus of this study.