Megachile (Chalicodoma) parietina (Geoffroy, 1785) is a Palearctic solitary bee included in the Red List of some central European Countries. Females build durable nests, reused year after year, by mixing soil with a salivary secretion. Like for most solitary bees, the resources contained within M. parietina nests attract several other insects which exploit pollen supplies or feed...
Heterogeneity at local and landscape scales can promote insect diversity and moderate insect declines that stem from global change. Determining how species respond to different landscape components provides insight into the role of heterogeneity in landscapes undergoing change. We examine how indigenous forest-grassland edges are used by butterflies. We assessed butterfly...
The Uncompahgre fritillary butterfly (Boloria improba acrocnema Gall LF, Sperling FAH (1980) A new high altitude species of Boloria from southwestern Colorado (Nyphalidae), with a discussion of phenetics and hierarchical decisions. J Lepidopterists’ Soc 34:230–252 1980) was listed as federally endangered in 1991 and is considered a habitat indicator for alpine ecosystem health...
Clearing of woodlands is used by graziers to promote pasture production, even though understanding of impacts of clearing on native fauna is lacking. We evaluate impacts of clearing on biodiversity by comparing invertebrates associated with ground-layer vegetation of cleared woodlands (grasslands) to that of nearby uncleared woodlands. Two replicates of grasslands consisting of...
Bees are the most important pollinators and, like many other insects, are facing a global decline that threatens crop pollination services. Both honey bees and some wild bee species are used commercially for pollination, including pollination in blueberry and cherry orchards. In our study, we assessed bee visits to experimental blueberry and cherry orchards immersed in an urban...
Rapid urbanization is among the factors that decrease insect diversity. However, by offering suitable habitats, green roofs could lessen this adverse effect. Certain factors, like a nearby public garden, could be useful predictor variables to analyze to what extent green roofs can support insect communities. The study aimed to measure the insect diversity on intensive green roofs...
We assessed the Caraboidea communities of Gorongosa National Park (GNP) in Mozambique. Influence of tropical rainfall, after a long period of drought, was evaluated on alpha and beta diversity of tiger- and ground-beetles in the main habitat types of the park: miombo forests, mixed forests, transitional forests, and grasslands (open savannas). Tiger- and ground-beetle communities...
Urbanized areas can impose selective pressures on insects which can be identified at the individual level based on animal physiological condition. Physiological condition can be measured from variables such as body size, body mass or energetic budget of individuals. We examined whether body mass, wing spot size and energy reserves (proteins, lipids and carbohydrates) were reduced...
Invertebrate populations are amongst the most widespread species, inhabiting a variety of habitats, however there is limited conservation effort due to the scarce knowledge on their population genetics. Here, we assess levels of genetic diversity and population structure of the Epirus dancing grasshopper (Chorthippus lacustris), a steno-endemic species, located in Northwest...
A diversity of insects can be found at the remains of dead animals (carrion) and they play a vital role in its decomposition and recycling. An emerging global problem with carrion is animal mass mortality events – the sudden, rapid die-off of many animals resulting in a large increase to the localised carrion resource pool. Yet, little is known about how insects respond to sudden...
The increasing frequency of fires is a major threat to biodiversity around the world, further facilitated by global warming. Fires usually affect insect populations directly, but insect eggs may partly be protected from wildfires when oviposited into the ground. Madeira belongs to the Macaronesian islands which experience wildfires annually. The Madeiran Green Bush-Cricket...
Coppice forests are socio-ecological systems especially rich in biodiversity. They have been transformed into high forest and abandoned across large areas of Europe over the past 200 years. Coppice loss is likely an important driver of insect declines. It is currently unclear whether habitat quality or decreasing connectivity of the remaining fragments is more important for the...
The survival of butterfly populations depends on successful oviposition strategies. The limited mobility of early life stages requires females to select sites that reflect larval requirements. However, as land use and climate changes are altering habitat conditions and micro-climate, some species may adapt ovipositing strategies and flourish while others, with narrow niche...
Sampling efficiency, composition and detection biases associated with pitfall-trap and sample plot (standardised hand-collecting) methods were compared at seven high montane sites at Lasha Mountain, Yunnan, China. Rarefaction-interpolation curves showed total species diversity and sample coverage from each method were undifferentiated. Permutational multivariate analysis of...
The wildfires of Australia’s Black Summer in 2019/2020 caused a massive loss of wildlife and habitats, but the effects of the fire on invertebrate species post-burn are unknown. We hypothesised that the fires would negatively affect the genetic diversity of invertebrate species by impeding movement between populations due to habitat loss. We studied the genetic diversity of a...
Appropriate sampling methods are essential for monitoring and managing all wildlife. There is limited information on how to monitor ground-dwelling invertebrates in the alpine zone compared to more commonly studied lower-elevation habitats. We aim to understand the strengths, weaknesses, and cost-effectiveness of invertebrate survey methods when deployed in the alpine zone. We...
The wild bee community of a sand steppe habitat in Eastern Austria was surveyed in the years 2018 and 2019, complemented with historical data from over 100 years, and analyzed in relation to land use change. The mapping of land use categories was based on historical aerial photographs and orthophotos. Changes in bee community composition were analyzed by a multivariate...
Conservation measures such as those under the European Green Deal aim to counteract the biodiversity loss by increasing the share of organic farming and reducing pesticide use, as well as increasing the proportion of semi-natural habitats (SNH) in agricultural landscapes. Given the large environmental impacts of agriculture, it is important to thoroughly understand effects of...
Flower flies (Diptera: Syrphidae; also known as hoverflies) are important pollinators of wild and cultivated plants. Other pollinators such as bees have declined, and many flower flies in Europe and Chile have been documented to be threatened with extinction. The status of other flower fly faunas is currently unknown. We assessed the rangewide conservation status of flower flies...
Diversity inventories are critical to creating accurate species range maps and estimating population sizes, which in turn lead to better informed landscape and wildlife management decisions. Metabarcoding has facilitated large-scale environmental diversity surveys. However, the use of a metabarcoding approach with bird feces to survey arthropod diversity is still relatively...
We discuss proposals to extend the list of protected insect species in Great Britain and question whether existing species protection measures are appropriate for insects whose ecology is substantially unknown. We highlight the practicalities of applying such measures to very poorly known taxa, whose identification depends upon highly experienced specialists and a tiny pool of...
Inconspicuous species challenge conservationists when it comes to delineate long-term conservation planning or assess their status, particularly when their actual distribution is poorly known. Invertebrates in particular feature among the less represented taxa in conservation assessments. Here we follow a multidisciplinary approach for assessing the conservation coverage and...
During the analysis of the biomonitoring data of Polish watercourses, it was found that the vast majority of aquatic insects (83–95% of more than 8.8 million individuals collected between 2012 and 2019) die unnecessarily during sampling, as a result of the sub-sampling procedure. Great, in some cases 30-fold differences in the mortality of insects, including those belonging to...
Conservation of rare and elusive butterflies can benefit from the use of contrasting survey techniques to confirm their presence and to understand the lifecycle in more detail. This case study trialed different survey techniques for all stages of the lifecycle (ova, larva, pupa and adult) to assess their value for monitoring Black Hairstreak (Satyrium pruni) populations in...
Bumblebee (Bombus spp.) queens overwintered in artificial settings tend to have low survival rates, raising concerns that diapause may be a particularly sensitive life cycle stage for this ecologically and economically valuable group of pollinators. However, it remains unclear whether lab-based estimates of diapause survival are comparable to survival rates of natural populations...