79b35a5c-b0f4-41a5-8cca-e889073848fc
https://ipt.gbif.us/resource?r=ars_hip
ars_hip
A survey of bees (Hymenoptera: Apoidea) in the Bear River Mountains in northern Utah
Diana
Cox-Foster
USDA, Agricultural Research Service, Pollinating Insect Research Unit
Research Leader
Logan
UT
US
diana.cox-foster@usda.gov
Lindsie
McCabe
USDA, Agricultural Research Service, Pollinating Insect Research Unit
Research Scientist
Logan
UT
US
lindsie.mccabe@usda.gov
Kelsey
Graham
USDA, Agricultural Research Service, Pollinating Insect Research Unit
Research Scientist
Logan
UT
US
kelsey.graham@usda.gov
Byron
Love
USDA, Agricultural Research Service, Pollinating Insect Research Unit
Entomologist
Logan
UT
US
byron.love@usda.gov
Jonathan
Koch
University of Hawaii at Manoa
Associate Professor
Honolulu
Hawaii
US
2026-04-06
eng
Bees provide critical pollination services to a diversity of flowering plants, facilitating the function of terrestrial ecosystems and global food production. Here, we present a checklist of bee species collected in conjunction with a larger systematic study in the Bear River Mountains of northern Utah, United States, over the course of three field seasons (2020 - 2022). The survey was conducted on public lands managed by the United States Forest Service, an agency within the U.S. Department of Agriculture. We collected 8500 bee specimens using pan traps, hand netting, and trap nests, representing at least 199 bee species belonging to 33 genera and five families. The checklist produced in the survey is critical for land managers and other stakeholders in developing pollinator management and conservation strategies, especially on public lands.
Apoidea
bee survey
Utah
public lands
forest service
bee inventory
GBIF Dataset Type Vocabulary: http://rs.gbif.org/vocabulary/gbif/dataset_type_2015-07-10.xml
Apoidea
bee survey
Utah
public lands
forest service
bee inventory
GBIF Dataset Subtype Vocabulary: http://rs.gbif.org/vocabulary/gbif/dataset_subtype.xml
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (CC-BY 4.0) License.
Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International
https://spdx.org/licenses/CC-BY-4.0.html
CC-BY-4.0
https://ipt.gbif.us/archive.do?r=ars_hip
The Bear River Mountains are a subset of the Wasatch Mountains (which in turn are a subset of the Rocky Mountains) straddling the northeastern Utah-Idaho border. Made primarily of limestone and dolomite, elevations range from 1,425–3,042 m in elevation. The climate is typical of semi-arid, high-desert mountains of the Intermountain West, with the majority of precipitation coming from winter snows, which melt throughout spring and into early summer. Mean temperatures range from -5.3C in January though 18.2C in July with an annual average of 710 mm precipitation (PRISM Group, Oregon State University 2014). The plant communites in this study include sagebrush steppe, open meadows, and mixed conifer and aspen forests. Pollen and nectar resources for bees are provided by a diverse assemblage of primarily perennial herbaceous forbs and woody shrubs.
Bees were systematically surveyed in three watersheds managed by the Wasatch-Cache US Forest Service, Blacksmith Fork (BS), Franklin Basin (FB), and Twin Creek (TC). Watersheds were spaced between 15-30 km apart, and ranged in elevation from 1793-2325 m. In the first year of this study (2020), only bees in Blacksmith Fork were sampled. In years two and three (2021 & 2022) sampling ocurred in all three watersheds.
-111.6016
-111.4626
41.9964
41.6869
family
Halictidae
phylum
Arthropoda
order
Hymenoptera
family
Andrenidae
family
Megachilidae
class
Insecta
family
Apidae
kingdom
Animalia
family
Colletidae
The authors thank ARS technician Craig Huntzinger, Tien Lindsay, and Makenna Bird and biological science aid Jesse Tabor, Alison Teague, Ashely Rohde, Brock Redmond, Tim Olson, Aletia James, Anna Billings, Sam Galt, Sierra Aston, Ann Gille, Solie Velez, and Emily Burgess for their assistance in field set up, bee management, bee x-ray examination and evaluation and data entry. For funding this project, we thank Project ApisM and Costco. This research was supported by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Agricultural Research Service. Mention of trade names or commercial products in this publication is solely for the purpose of providing specific information and does not imply recommendation or endorsement by the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
unknown
Diana
Cox-Foster
USDA, Agricultural Research Service, Pollinating Insect Research Unit
Research Leader
Logan
UT
US
diana.cox-foster@usda.gov
Lindsie
McCabe
USDA, Agricultural Research Service, Pollinating Insect Research Unit
Research Scientist
Logan
UT
US
Lindsie.McCabe@usda.gov
Kelsey
Graham
USDA, Agricultural Research Service, Pollinating Insect Research Unit
Research Scientist
Logan
UT
US
Kelsey.Graham@usda.gov
Byron
Love
USDA, Agricultural Research Service, Pollinating Insect Research Unit
Entomologist
Logan
UT
US
byron.love@usda.gov
A survey of bees (Hymenoptera: Apoidea) in the Bear River Mountains in northern Utah
Diana
Cox-Foster
Lindsie
McCabe
Kelsey
Graham
Byron
Love
Bees provide critical pollination services to a diversity of flowering plants, facilitating the function of terrestrial ecosystems and global food production. Here, we present a checklist of bee species collected in conjunction with a larger systematic study in the Bear River Mountains of northern Utah, United States, over the course of three field seasons (2020-2022). The survey was conducted on public lands managed by the United States Forest Service, an agency within the U.S. Department of Agriculture. We collected 8296 bee specimens using pan traps, hand netting, and trap nests, representing at least 199 bee species belonging to 33 genera and five families. The checklist produced in the survey is critical for land managers and other stakeholders in developing pollinator management and conservation strategies, especially on public lands.
This study was funded by Project ApisM and Costco, and supported by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Agricultural Research Service, Project Plan 2080-30500-001-000D.
The Bear River Mountains are a subset of the Wasatch Mountains (which in turn are a subset of the Rocky Mountains) straddling the northeastern Utah-Idaho border. Made primarily of limestone and dolomite, elevations range from 1,425 – 3,042 m in elevation. The climate is typical of semi-arid, high-desert mountains of the Intermountain West, with the majority of precipitation coming from winter snows, which melt throughout spring and into early summer. Mean temperatures range from -5.3C in January though 18.2C in July with an annual average of 710 mm precipitation. The plant communites in this study include sagebrush steppe, open meadows, and mixed conifer and aspen forests. Pollen and nectar resources for bees are provided by a diverse assemblage of primarily perennial herbaceous forbs and woody shrubs.
In each watershed, we established seven 20 x 20 m plots spaced between 0.5-3.5 km apart. The plot sampling schedule was determined by snowmelt (i.e., accessability) and personnel availability. Plots were sampled approximately every two weeks starting roughly two weeks after snow melt (early to mid-June) through August for a total of 37 surveys. In 2021 sampling ended the second week of August due to an extreme drought, and began the third week in June in 2022 due to late-melting snow. Bee surveys were conducted in each plot using three methods, hand netting, pan traps and trap nests.
Net Collecting: One to three people collected bees at flowers blooming within plots for a total of one-person-hour per sampling date (1 person = 1 hour, 2 people = 30 minutes each, 3 people = 20 minutes each). Netting occurred between the hours of 9:00am - 4:00pm during conditions favorable to bees (i.e. sunny and warm, no precipitation or excessive wind).
Pan Collecting: Nine 3.25 oz Solo brand plastic bowls (Solo brand stock number PB6-0099) in three colors (painted fluorescent yelow, fluorescent blue, and stock white) were filled with soapy water (made up of a 1:1000 solution of Dawn brand blue dish soap in water) and deployed in plots on the same day as net collecting. The bowls were placed in a Y-shape such that an approximately 3m radius circle was described (McCabe et al. 2019). Pan traps were set out for 4-6 hours between 8am and 4:30pm. Specimens were seived and transferred to 4 oz Whirl-Pak bags with 70% ethyl alcohol and kept refrigerated.
Trap Nest Collecting: Nest blocks were used as part of a larger study to determine habitat quality for the managed solitary bee Osmia bruneri. We used this opportunity to survey for local cavity-nesting bees utilizing the same nest materials. Wood blocks (8 x 8 x 15 cm) with 16 drilled 4 mm holes were fitted with paper straw inserts and placed at each site on metal fenceposts 1m off the ground facing southeast. Blocks were stocked with eight O. bruneri nest straws containing a total of approximately 40 live adults (range 39-43) assuming a 1:1 sex ratio (Frohlich and Tepedino 1986). Nest blocks were deployed for the entirety of each field season and inspected approximately every other week during netting and pan trap sampling. Capped nests were replaced with empty straws to ensure constant nest site availability.
Completed (capped) nests were brought back to the USDA-ARS Pollinating Insect Research Unit (PIRU) in Logan, UT. to complete development under local ambient temperature. Nests were x-rayed periodically to confirm the number of cells provisioned and monitor development. Nest cells were stripped at the end of summer and placed into individual gel caps prior to placing in a 4C cooler for winter diapause. Cells were then incubated at 26C beginning in mid spring of the following year and inspected daily for emergence and curation.
2025-07-07T15:36:19.594+00:00
dataset
79b35a5c-b0f4-41a5-8cca-e889073848fc/v1.4.xml