Flies like yellow, bees like blue: how flower colours cater to the taste of pollinating insects

Hoverfly (*Eristalis tenax*) feeding on marigold.
Fir0002/Flagstaffotos, CC BY-NC

Jair Garcia, RMIT University; Adrian Dyer, RMIT University, and Mani Shrestha, Bayreuth UniversityWe all know the birds and the bees are important for pollination, and we often notice them in gardens and parks. But what about flies?

Flies are the second most common type of pollinator, so perhaps we should all be taught about the bees, the flies and then the birds. While we know animals may see colour differently, little was known about how fly pollination shapes the types of flowers we can find in nature.

In our new study we address this gap in our knowledge by evaluating how important fly pollinators sense and use colour, and how fly pollinated flowers have evolved colour signals.

Specialed flower visiting flies: a hoverfly (*Eristalis tenax*) (left panel), and a bee-fly (*Poecilanthrax apache*) (right panel)
Michael Becker, Pdeley

The way we see influences what we choose

We know that different humans often have preferences for certain colours, and in a similar way bees prefer blue hues.

Our colleague Lea Hannah has observed that hoverflies (Eristalis tenax) are much better at distinguishing between different shades of yellow than between different blues. Other research has also reported hoverflies have innate responses to yellow colours.

Many flowering plants depend on attracting pollinators to reproduce, so the appearance of their flowers has evolved to cater to the preferences of the pollinators. We wanted to find out what this might mean for how different insects like bees or flies shape flower colours in a complex natural environment where both types of insect are present.

The Australian case study

Australia is a natural laboratory for understanding flower evolution due to its geological isolation. On the mainland Australian continent, flowers have predominately evolved colours to suit animal pollination.

Around Australia there are plant communities with different pollinators. For example, Macquarie Island has no bees, and flies are the only animal pollinator.

We assembled data from different locations, including a native habitat in mainland Australia where both bees and flies forage, to model how different insects influence flower colour signal evolution.

Measuring flower colours

Since we know different animals sense colour in different ways, we recorded the spectrum of different wavelengths of light reflected from the flowers with a spectrometer. We subsequently modelled these spectral signatures of plant flowers considering animal perception, allowing us to objectively quantify how signals have evolved. These analyses included mapping the evolutionary ancestry of the plants.

Generalisation or specialisation?

According to one school of thought, flower evolution is driven by competition between flowering plants. In this scenario, different species might have very different colours from one another, to increase their chances of being reliably identified and pollinated. This is a bit like how exclusive brands seek customers by having readily identifiable branding.

An alternative hypothesis to competition is facilitation. Plants may share preferred colour signals to attract a higher number of specific insects. This explanation is like how some competing businesses can do better by being physically close together to attract many customers.

Our results demonstrate how flower colour signalling has dynamically evolved depending on the availability of insect pollinators, as happens in marketplaces.

In Victoria, flowers have converged to evolve colour signals preferred by their pollinators. The flowers of fly-pollinated orchids are typically yellowish-green, while closely related orchids pollinated by bees have more bluish and purple colours. The flowers appeared to share the preferred colours of their main pollinator, consistent with a facilitation hypothesis.

Typical flowers preferred by bees (*Lobelia rhombifolia*, left panel) and flies (*Pterostylis melagramma*, right panel) encountered in our study sites. Inserts show the spectral profile for each species as measured by a spectrometer.
Mani Shrestha

Our research showed flies can see differences between flowers of different species in response to the pollinator local “market”.

On Macquarie Island, where flies are the only pollinators, flower colours diverge from each other – but still stay within the range of the flies’ preferred colours. This is consistent with a competition strategy, where differences between plant species allow flies to more easily identify the colour of recently visited flowers.

When both fly and bee pollinators are present, flowers pollinated by flies appear to “filter out” bees to reduce the number of ineffective and opportunistic visitors. For example, in the Himalayas specialised plants require flies with long tongues to access floral rewards. This is similar to when a store wants to exclusively attract customers specifically interested in their product range.

Our findings on fly colour vision, along with novel precision agriculture techniques, can help using flies as alternative pollinators of crops. It also allows us to understand that if we want to see a full range of pollinating insects including beautiful hoverflies in our parks and gardens, we need to plant a range of flower types and colours.

Jair Garcia, Research fellow, RMIT University; Adrian Dyer, Associate Professor, RMIT University, and Mani Shrestha, Postdoc & International Fellow, Disturbance Ecology, Bayreuth University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Dawson’s Burrowing Bees

Giant bird-eating centipedes exist — and they’re surprisingly important for their ecosystem

Luke Halpin, Monash University; Rohan Clarke, Monash University, and Rowan Mott, Monash UniversityGiant bird-eating centipedes may sound like something out of a science-fiction film — but they’re not. On tiny Phillip Island, part of the South Pacific’s Norfolk Island group, the Phillip Island centipede (Cormocephalus coynei) population can kill and eat up to 3,700 seabird chicks each year.

And this is entirely natural. This unique creature endemic to Phillip Island has a diet consisting of an unusually large proportion of vertebrate animals including seabird chicks.

Phillip Island in the Norfolk Island group, with a valley of iconic Norfolk Island Pine trees.
Luke Halpin

As large marine predators, seabirds usually sit at the top of the food chain. But our new study, published in The American Naturalist, demonstrates this isn’t always the case.

We show how large, predatory arthropods can play an important role in the food webs of island ecosystems. And the Phillip Island centipede achieves this through its highly varied diet.

A well-armed predator stirs in the night

This centipede can grow to almost one foot (or 30.5cm) in length. It is armed with a potent venom encased in two pincer-like appendages called “forcipules”, which it uses to immobilise its prey. Its body is protected by shield-like armoured plates that line each of the many segments that make up its length.

On warm and humid nights, these strictly nocturnal arthropods hunt through thick leaf litter, navigating a labyrinth of seabird burrows peppered across the forest floor. A centipede on the prowl will use its two ultra-sensitive antennae to navigate as it seeks prey.

The centipede hunts an unexpectedly varied range of quarry, from crickets to seabird chicks, geckos and skinks. It even hunts fish — dropped by seabirds called black noddies (Anous minuta) that make their nests in the trees above.

A frightful discovery

Soon after we began our research on the ecology of Phillip Island’s burrowing seabirds, we discovered chicks of black-winged petrels (Pterodroma nigripennis) were falling prey to the Phillip Island centipede.

We knew this needed further investigation, so we set out to unravel the mystery of this large arthropod’s dietary habits.

Black-winged petrel chick just prior to being weighed on Phillip Island.
Trudy Chatwin

To find out what these centipedes were eating, we studied their feeding activities at night and recorded the prey species they were targeting. We also monitored petrel chicks in their burrow nests every few days, for months at a time.

We eventually began to see consistent injury patterns among chicks that were killed. We even witnessed one centipede attacking and eating a chick.

From the rates of predation we observed, we calculated that the Phillip Island centipede population can kill and eat between 2,109 and 3,724 petrel chicks each year. The black-winged petrels — of which there are up to 19,000 breeding pairs on the island — appear to be resilient to this level of predation.

Envenomation of a black-winged petrel nestling by a Phillip Island centipede. (Video by Daniel Terrington)

And the predation of black-winged petrels by Phillip Island centipedes is an entirely natural predator-prey relationship. By preying on vertebrates, the centipedes trap nutrients brought from the ocean by seabirds and distribute them around the island.

In some sense, they’ve taken the place (or ecological niche) of predatory mammals, which are absent from the island.

Luke Halpin monitoring black-winged petrel chicks on Phillip Island.
Trudy Chatwin

Restoration and recovery

Up until just a few decades ago the Phillip Island Centipede was very rare. In fact, it was only formally described as a species in 1984.

After an intensive search in 1980, only a few small individuals were found. The species’s rarity back then was most likely due to severely degraded habitats caused by pigs, goats and rabbits introduced by humans to the island.

The removal of these invasive pests enabled black-winged petrels to colonise. Their population has since exploded and they’re now the most abundant of the 13 seabird species that breed on Phillip Island.

They provide a high-quality food source for the Phillip Island centipede and have therefore likely helped centipede population to recover.

Black-winged petrels on Phillip Island are active both during the day and at night. (Video by Luke Halpin)

Ancient bone deposits in the soil suggest that prior to the black-winged petrel’s arrival, Phillip Island was home to large numbers of other small burrow-nesting seabird species. It’s likely the Phillip Island centipede preyed on these seabirds too.

Now, thanks to the conservation efforts of Norfolk Island National Park, the island’s forest is regenerating alongside endemic species like the centipede, as well as the critically endangered Phillip Island hibiscus (Hibiscus insularis).

The endemic Phillip Island hibiscus.
Luke Halpin

As a driver of nutrient transfer, the persistence of the Phillip Island centipede (and its healthy appetite) might just be key to the island’s ecosystem recovery. But we’ll need to do more research to fully understand the intricate links in this bustling food web.

Luke Halpin, Ecologist, Monash University; Rohan Clarke, Director, Monash Drone Discovery Platform, and Senior Lecturer in Ecology, Monash University, and Rowan Mott, Biologist, Monash University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

How a bee sees: tiny bumps on flower petals give them their intense colour — and help them survive

Adrian Dyer, RMIT University and Jair Garcia, RMIT UniversityThe intense colours of flowers have inspired us for centuries. They are celebrated through poems and songs praising the red of roses and blue of violets, and have inspired iconic pieces of art such as Vincent Van Gogh’s sunflowers.

Vase with Three Sunflowers by Vincent Van Gough — Vase with Three Sunflowers by Vincent Van Gogh.

But flowers did not evolve their colour for our pleasure. They did so to attract pollinators. Therefore, to understand why flowers produce such vibrant colours, we have to consider how pollinators such as bees perceive colour.

When observed under a powerful microscope, most flower petals show a textured surface made up of crests or “bumps”. Our research, published in the Journal of Pollination Ecology, shows that these structures have frequently evolved to interact with light, to enhance the colour produced by the pigments under the textured surface.

A flower of *Tibouchina urvilleana* observed under a powerful scanning electron microscope shows a typical bumpy petal surface (left). In comparison, the opposite (abaxial) petal side, rarely seen by an approaching pollinator, shows a less textured surface (right).
Author provided

Sunshiney daze

Bees such as honeybees and bumblebees can perceive flower colours that are invisible to us — such as those produced by reflected ultraviolet radiation.

Plants must invest in producing reliable and noticeable colours to stand out among other plant species. Flowers that do this have a better chance of being visited by bees and pollinating successfully.

However, one problem with flower colours is sunlight may directly reflect off a petal’s surface. This can potentially reduce the quality of the pigment colour, depending on the viewing angle.

You may have experienced this when looking at a smooth coloured surface on a sunny day, where the intensity of the colour is affected by the direction of light striking the surface. We can solve this problem by changing our viewing position, or by taking the object to a more suitable place. Bees, on the other hand, have to view flowers in the place they bloom.

Bumblebee on a smooth blue surface, where the colour is affected by light reflection.

We were interested in whether this visual problem also existed for bees, and if plants have evolved special tricks to help bees find them more easily.

How bees use flower surfaces

It has been known for some time that flowering plants most often have conical-shaped cell structures within the texture of their petal surfaces, and that flat petal surfaces are relatively rare. A single plant gene can manipulate whether a flower has conical-shaped cells within the surface of a petal — but the reason why this evolved has remained unclear.

Past research suggested the conical petal surface acted as a signal to attract pollinators. But experiments with bees have shown this isn’t the case. Other explanations relate to hydrophobicity (the ability to repel water). But again, experiments have revealed this can’t be the only reason.

We investigated how bumblebees use flower surfaces with or without conical petal shapes. Bees are a useful animal for research as they can be trained to collect a reward, and tested to see how they perceive their environment.

Bumblebees can also be housed and tested indoors, where it is easier to precisely mimic a complex flower environment as it might work in nature.

Flowers cater to a bee’s needs

Our colleague in Germany, Saskia Wilmsen, first measured the petal surfaces of a large number of plants and identified the most common conical surfaces.

She then selected some relatively smooth petal or leaf surfaces reflecting light from an artificial source as a comparison. Finally, blue casts were made from these samples, and subsequently displayed to free-flying bees.

In the experiment, conducted with bumblebees in Germany, a sugar solution reward could be collected by bees flying to any of the artificial flowers. They had to choose between flying either towards “sunlight” — which could result in light reflections affecting the flower’s coloration — or with the light source behind the bee.

The experiment found when light came from behind the bees, there was no preference for flower type. But for bees flying towards the light, there was a significant preference for choosing the flower with a more “bumpy” conical surface. This bumpy surface served to diffuse the incoming light, improving the colour signal of the flower.

The results indicate flowers most likely evolved bumpy surfaces to minimise light reflections, and maintain the colour saturation and intensity needed to entice pollinators. Humans are probably just lucky beneficiaries of this solution biology has evolved. We also get to see intense flower colours. And for that, we have pollinators to thank.

Adrian Dyer, Associate Professor, RMIT University and Jair Garcia, Research fellow, RMIT University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

A lone tree makes it easier for birds and bees to navigate farmland, like a stepping stone between habitats

Carla Archibald, Deakin University; Eduardo van den Berg, Federal University of Lavras, and Jonathan Rhodes, The University of QueenslandVast, treeless paddocks and fields can be dangerous for wildlife, who encounter them as “roadblocks” between natural areas nearby. But our new research found even one lone tree in an otherwise empty paddock can make a huge difference to an animal’s movement.

We focused on the Atlantic Forest in Brazil, a biodiversity hotspot with 1,361 different known species of wildlife, such as jaguars, sloths, tamarins and toucans. Habitat loss from expanding and intensifying farmland, however, increasingly threatens the forest’s rich diversity of species and ecosystems.

We researched the value of paddock trees and hedges for birds and bees, and found small habitat features like these can double how easily they find their way through farmland.

This is important because enabling wildlife to journey across farmlands not only benefits the conservation of species, but also people. It means bees can improve crop pollination, and seed-dispersing birds can help restore ecosystems.

Connecting habitats

Lone trees in paddocks, hedges and tree-lined fences are common features of farmlands across the world, from Brazil to Australia.

They may be few and far between, but this scattered vegetation makes important areas of refuge for birds and bees, acting like roads or stepping stones to larger natural habitats nearby.

Scattered paddock trees, for instance, offer shelter, food, and places to land. They’ve also been found to create cooler areas within their canopy and right beneath it, providing some relief on scorching summer days.

Hedges and tree-lined fences are also important, as they provide a safe pathway by providing hiding places from predators.

White-browed meadowlark perched on a bush in a farm paddock within the Atlantic Forest.
Milton Andrade Jr, CC BY

For our research, we used satellite images of the Atlantic Forest and randomly selected 20 landscapes containing different amounts of forest cover.

We then used mathematical models to calculate the habitat connectivity of these landscapes for three groups of species — bees, small birds such as the rufous-bellied thrush, and large birds such as toucans — based on how far they can travel.

And we found in areas with low forest cover, wildlife is twice as likely to move from one natural habitat to another if paddock trees and hedges can be used as stepping stones.

We also found vegetation around creeks and waterways are the most prevalent and important type of on-farm habitat for wildlife movement. In Brazil, there are legal protections for these areas preventing them from being cleared, which means vegetation along waterways has become relatively common compared to lone trees and hedges, in places with lower forest cover.

Insights for Australia

While the contribution of lone trees, hedges and tree-lined fences towards conservation targets is relatively low, our research shows they’re still important. And we can apply this knowledge more widely.

Two koalas sitting on a branch — Koalas use roadside vegetation for feeding and resting.
Shutterstock

For example, in Australia, many koala populations depend on scattered trees for movement and habitat. In 2018, CSIRO researchers in Queensland tracked koalas using GPS, and found koalas used roadside vegetation and scattered trees for feeding and resting significantly more than they expected.

Likewise, lone trees, hedges and tree-lined fences can also facilitate the movement of Australian fruit-eating birds such as the olive-backed oriole and the rose-crowned fruit dove. Improving habitat connectivity can help these birds travel across landscapes, feeding and dispersing seeds as they go.

In fragmented landscapes, where larger patches of vegetation are hard to find, dispersing the seeds of native plants encourages natural regeneration of ecosystems. This is a key strategy to help achieve environmental restoration and conservation targets.

Policies overlook lone trees

In Brazil, there’s a strong initiative to restore natural areas, known as the Brazilian Pact for Restoration. This pact is a commitment from non-government organisations, government, companies and research centres to restore 15 million hectares of native vegetation by 2050.

However, the pact doesn’t recognise the value of lone trees, hedges and tree-lined fences.

Likewise, the Brazilian Forest Code has historically provided strong legal protection for forests since it was introduced. While this policy does value vegetation along waterways, it overlooks the value of lone trees, hedges or tree-lined fences.

These oversights could result in poor connectivity between natural areas, seriously hampering conservation efforts.

Australia doesn’t fare much better. For example, in Queensland, the native vegetation management laws protect only intact native vegetation or vegetation of a certain age. This means scattered, but vital, vegetation isn’t protected from land clearing.

Small habitat features scattered across a farm paddock in the Atlantic Forest.
Flávia Freire Siqueira, CC BY., Author provided

Helping your local wildlife

But farmers and other landowners in Australia can make a big difference through land stewardship grant schemes (such as from Landcare) and private land conservation programs (such as Land for Wildlife or conservation covenants).

These schemes and programs can help landowners finance revegetation and protect native vegetation. Grants and programs vary by state and territory, and local council.

Restoring natural areas is a key goal on the global conservation agenda for the next decade, and it’s clear that lone trees, hedges and tree-lined fences on farms may play a larger role than once thought.

So think twice before you remove a tree or a hedge. It might be a crucial stepping stone for your local birds and bees.

The authors gratefully acknowledge the contributions of Dr Flávia Freire Siqueira who led this research collaboration, and co-authours Dr Dulcineia de Carvalho and Dr Vanessa Leite Rezende from the Federal University of Lavras.

Carla Archibald, Research Fellow, Conservation Science, Deakin University; Eduardo van den Berg, , Federal University of Lavras, and Jonathan Rhodes, Associate Professor, The University of Queensland

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

About 500,000 Australian species are undiscovered – and scientists are on a 25-year mission to finish the job

Kevin Thiele, The University of Western Australia and Jane Melville, Museums VictoriaHere are two quiz questions for you. How many species of animals, plants, fungi, fish, insects and other organisms live in Australia? And how many of these have been discovered and named?

To the first, the answer is we don’t really know. But the best guess of taxonomists – the scientists who discover, name, classify and document species – is that Australia’s lands, rivers, coasts and oceans probably house more than 700,000 distinct species.

On the second, taxonomists estimate almost 200,000 species have been scientifically named since Europeans first began exploring, collecting and classifying Australia’s remarkable fauna and flora.

Together, these estimates are disturbing. After more than 300 years of effort, scientists have documented fewer than one-third of Australia’s species. The remaining 70% are unknown, and essentially invisible, to science.

Taxonomists in Australia name an average 1,000 new species each year. At that rate, it will take at least 400 years to complete even a first-pass stocktake of Australia’s biodiversity.

This poor knowledge is a serious threat to Australia’s environment. And a first-of-its kind report released today shows it’s also a huge missed economic opportunity. That’s why today, Australia’s taxonomists are calling on governments, industry and the community to support an important mission: discovering and documenting all Australian species within 25 years.

Australia: a biodiversity hotspot

Biologically, Australia is one of the richest and most diverse nations on Earth – between 7% and 10% of all species on Earth occur here. It also has among the world’s highest rates of species discovery. But our understanding of biodiversity is still very, very incomplete.

Of course, First Nations peoples discovered, named and classified many species within their knowledge systems long before Europeans arrived. But we have no ready way yet to compare their knowledge with Western taxonomy.

Finding new species in Australia is not hard – there are almost certainly unnamed species of insects, spiders, mites and fungi in your backyard. Any time you take a bush holiday you’ll drive past hundreds of undiscovered species. The problem is recognising the species as new and finding the time and resources to deal with them all.

Taxonomists describe and name new species only after very careful due diligence. Every specimen must be compared with all known named species and with close relatives to ensure it is truly a new species. This often involves detailed microscopic studies and gene sequencing.

More fieldwork is often needed to collect specimens and study other species. Specimens in museums and herbaria all over the world sometimes need to be checked. After a great deal of work, new species are described in scientific papers for others to assess and review.

So why do so many species remain undiscovered? One reason is a shortage of taxonomists trained to the level needed. Another is that technologies to substantially speed up the task have only been developed in the past decade or so. And both these, of course, need appropriate levels of funding.

Of course, some groups of organisms are better known than others. In general, noticeable species – mammals, birds, plants, butterflies and the like – are fairly well documented. Most less noticeable groups – many insects, fungi, mites, spiders and marine invertebrates – remain poorly known. But even inconspicuous species are important.

Fungi, for example, are essential for maintaining our natural ecosystems and agriculture. They fertilise soils, control pests, break down litter and recycle nutrients. Without fungi, the world would literally grind to a halt. Yet, more than 90% of Australian fungi are believed to be unknown.

fungi on log — Fungi plays an essential ecosystem role.
Shutterstock

Mind the knowledge gap

So why does all this matter?

First, Australia’s biodiversity is under severe and increasing threat. To manage and conserve our living organisms, we must first discover and name them.

At present, it’s likely many undocumented species are becoming extinct, invisibly, before we know they exist. Or, perhaps worse, they will be discovered and named from dead specimens in our museums long after they have gone extinct in nature.

Second, many undiscovered species are crucial in maintaining a sustainable environment for us all. Others may emerge as pests and threats in future; most species are rarely noticed until something goes wrong. Knowing so little about them is a huge risk.

Third, enormous benefits are to be gained from these invisible species, once they are known and documented. A report released today
by Deloitte Access Economics, commissioned by Taxonomy Australia, estimates a benefit to the national economy of between A$3.7 billion and A$28.9 billion if all remaining Australian species are documented.

Benefits will be greatest in biosecurity, medicine, conservation and agriculture. The report found every $1 invested in discovering all remaining Australian species will bring up to $35 of economic benefits. Such a cost-benefit analysis has never before been conducted in Australia.

The investment would cover, among other things, research infrastructure, an expanded grants program, a national effort to collect specimens of all species and new facilities for gene sequencing.

Two scientists walk through wetlands holding boxes — Discovering new species often involves lots of field work.
Shutterstock

Mission possible

Australian taxonomists – in museums, herbaria, universities, at the CSIRO and in
government departments – have spent the last few years planning an ambitious mission to discover and document all remaining Australian species within a generation.

So, is this ambitious goal achievable, or even imaginable? Fortunately, yes.

It will involve deploying new and emerging technologies, including high-throughput robotic DNA sequencing, artificial intelligence and supercomputing. This will vastly speed up the process from collecting specimens to naming new species, while ensuring rigour and care in the science.

A national meeting of Australian taxonomists, including the young early career researchers needed to carry the mission through, was held last year. The meeting confirmed that with the right technologies and more keen and bright minds trained for the task, the rate of species discovery in Australia could be sped up by the necessary 16-fold – reducing 400 years of effort to 25 years.

With the right people, technologies and investment, we could discover all Australian species. By 2050 Australia could be the world’s first biologically mega-rich nation to have documented all our species, for the direct benefit of this and future generations.

Kevin Thiele, Adjunct Assoc. Professor, The University of Western Australia and Jane Melville, Senior Curator, Terrestrial Vertebrates, Museums Victoria

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Fly infertility shows we’re underestimating how badly climate change harms animals

Belinda van Heerwaarden, The University of Melbourne and Ary Hoffmann, The University of MelbourneEvidence of declining fertility in humans and wildlife is growing. While chemicals in our environment have been identified as a major cause, our new research shows there’s another looming threat to animal fertility: climate change.

We know animals can die when temperatures rise to extremes they cannot endure. However, our research suggests males of some species can become infertile even at less extreme temperatures.

This means the distribution of species may be limited by the temperatures at which they can reproduce, rather than the temperatures at which they can survive.

These findings are important, because they mean we may be underestimating the impacts of climate change on animals – and failing to identify the species most likely to become extinct.

two flies mating on a leaf — The distribution of some species may be limited by the temperatures at which they can reproduce.
Shutterstock

Feeling the heat

Researchers have known for some time that animal fertility is sensitive to heat stress.

For example, research shows a 2℃ temperature rise dramatically reduces the production of sperm bundles and egg size in corals. And in many beetle and bee species, fertilisation success drops sharply at high temperatures.

High temperatures have also been shown to affect fertilisation or sperm count in cows, pigs, fish and birds.

However, temperatures that cause infertility have not been incorporated into predictions about how climate change will affect biodiversity. Our research aims to address this.

eggs on straw — High temperatures can affect bird reproduction.
Shutterstock

A focus on flies

The paper published today involved researchers from the United Kingdom, Sweden and Australia, including one author of this article. The study examined 43 species of fly to test whether male fertility temperatures were a better predictor of global fly distributions than the temperatures at which the adult fly dies – also known as their “survival limit”.

The researchers exposed flies to four hours of heat stress at temperatures ranging from benign to lethal. From this data they estimated both the temperature that is lethal to 80% of individuals and the temperature at which 80% of surviving males become infertile.

They found 11 of 43 species experienced an 80% loss in fertility at cooler-than-lethal temperatures immediately following heat stress. Rather than fertility recovering over time, the impact of high temperatures was more pronounced seven days after exposure to heat stress. Using this delayed measure, 44% of species (19 out of 43) showed fertility loss at cooler-than-lethal temperatures.

The researchers then matched these findings to real-world data on the flies’ distribution, and estimated the average maximum air temperatures the species are likely to encounter in the wild. They found the distribution of fly species is linked more closely to the effects of high temperature on male fertility than on temperatures that kill flies.

These fertility responses are crucial to species survival. A separate study led by one author of this article, using simulated climate change in the laboratory, showed experimental populations of the same flies become extinct not because they can’t survive the heat, but because the males become infertile. Species from tropical rainforests were the first to succumb to extinction.

The prediction that tropical and sub-tropical species may be more vulnerable to climate change is not new. But the fertility findings suggest the negative impact of climate change may be even worse than anticipated.

Flies on a stick — The research found fly fertility is affected at lower-than-lethal temperatures.
Shutterstock

What does all this mean?

Some animals have adapted to minimise the effect of high temperature on fertility. For instance, it’s thought testes in male primates and humans are externally located to protect the developing sperm from excessive heat.

As the planet warms, animals may further evolve to withstand the effects of heat on fertility. But the speed at which a species can adapt may be too slow to ensure their survival. Our research has shown both tropical and widespread species of flies could not increase their fertility when exposed to simulated global warming, even after 25 generations.

A study involving beetles also indicates fertility damage from successive heatwaves can accumulate over time. And more work is needed to determine how other stressors such as salinity, chemicals and poor nutrition may compound the fertility-temperature problem.

Whether our findings extrapolate to other species, including mammals such as humans, is not yet clear. It’s certainly possible, given evidence across the animal kingdom that fertility is sensitive to heat stress.

Either way, unless global warming is radically curbed, animal fertility will likely decline. This means Earth may be heading for far more species extinctions than previously anticipated.

Belinda van Heerwaarden, Future Fellow, The University of Melbourne and Ary Hoffmann, Professor, School of BioSciences and Bio21 Institute, The University of Melbourne

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

The Most Painful Insect Sting

After the floods, stand by for spiders, slugs and millipedes – but think twice before reaching for the bug spray

Caitlyn Forster, University of Sydney; Dieter Hochuli, University of Sydney, and Eliza Middleton, University of SydneyRecord-breaking rain has destroyed properties across New South Wales, forcing thousands of people to evacuate and leaving hundreds homeless.

Humans aren’t the only ones in trouble. Many of the animals that live with and around us are also heading for higher ground as the floodwaters rise.

Often small creatures — especially invertebrates like spiders, cockroaches and millipedes — will seek refuge in the relatively dry and safe environments of people’s houses. While this can be a problem for the human inhabitants of the house, it’s important to make sure we don’t add to the ecological impact of the flood with an overzealous response to these uninvited guests.

Warragamba Dam in southwestern Sydney has been spilling a Sydney Harbour’s worth of water each day during the rains.
Eliza Middleton, Author provided

What floods do to ecosystems

Floods can have a huge impact on ecosystems, triggering landslides, increasing erosion, and introducing pollutants and soil into waterways. One immediate effect is to force burrowing animals out of their homes, as they retreat to safer and drier locations. Insects and other invertebrates living in grass or leaf litter around our homes are also displaced.

Burrowing invertebrates come to the surface during floods, providing food for opportunistic birds.
Dieter Hochuli, Author provided

Snakes have reportedly been “invading” homes in the wake of the current floods. Spiders too have fled the rising waters. Heavy rain can flood the burrows of the Australian funnelweb, one of the world’s most venomous spiders.

Some invertebrates will boom; others may plummet

Rain increases greenery, which can support breeding booms of animals such as mosquitoes, locusts, and snails.

Even species that don’t thrive after floods are likely to become more visible as they flock to our houses for refuge. But an apparent short-term increase in numbers may conceal a longer story of decline.

After periods of flooding, the abundance of invertebrates can fall by more than 90% and the number of different species in an area significantly drops. This has important implications for the recovery of an ecosystem, as many of the ground dwelling invertebrates displaced by floods are needed for soil cycling and decomposition.

So before you reach for the bug spray, consider the important role these animals play in our ecosystem.

What to do with the extra house guests?

If your house has been flooded, uninvited creatures taking shelter in your house are probably one of the smaller issues you are facing.

Once the rain subsides, cleaning in and around your property will help reduce unwanted visitors. Inside your house, you may see an increase in cockroaches, which flourish in humid environments. Ventilating the house to dry out any wet surfaces can help get rid of cockroach infestations, and filling crevices can also deter unwanted visitors.

In the garden, you may see an increase in flies in the coming weeks and months as they lay eggs in rotting plants. Consider removing any fruit and vegetables in the garden that may rot.

Mosquitoes are also one to watch as they lay eggs in standing water. Some species pose a risk of diseases such as Ross River virus. To prevent unwanted mozzies, make sure to empty things that have filled with rainwater, such as buckets and birdbaths.

If you do encounter one of our more dangerous animals in your home, such as venomous snakes and spiders, do not handle them yourself. If you find an injured or distressed snake, or are concerned about snakes in your house, call your local wildlife group who will be able to relocate them for you.

Just like the floods, which will subside as the water moves on, the uninvited gathering of animals is a temporary event. Most visitors will quickly disperse back to more appropriate habitat when the weather dries, and their usual homes are available again.

You may see an increase in slugs in your local area after rainy conditions.
Eliza Middleton @smiley_lize

Don’t sweat the small stuff

While many of the impacts of floods are our own making, through poor planning and development in flood-prone areas, effective design of cities and backyards can mitigate the risks of floods. Vegetation acts as a “sponge” for stormwater, and appropriate drainage allows water to flow through more effectively. Increasing backyard vegetation also provides extra habitat for important invertebrate species, including pollinators and decomposers.

With severe weather events on the rise, it is important to understand how ecosystems respond to, and recover from natural disasters. If invertebrates are unable to perform vital ecosystem functions, such as soil cycling, decomposition, and pollination, ecosystems may struggle to return to their pre-flood state. If the ecosystems don’t recover, we may see prolonged booms of nuisance pests such as mosquitoes.

A few temporary visitors are are a minor inconvenience in comparison to the impacts floods have on the environment, infrastructure and the health and well-being of people impacted. So while it may seem like a bit of a creepy inconvenience, maybe we should let our house guests stay until the flood waters go down.

Caitlyn Forster, PhD Candidate, School of Life and Environmental Sciences, University of Sydney; Dieter Hochuli, Professor, School of Life and Environmental Sciences, University of Sydney, and Eliza Middleton, Laboratory Manager, School of Life and Environmental Sciences, University of Sydney

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Phantom of the forest: after 100 years in hiding, I rediscovered the rare cloaked bee in Australia

James B. Dorey, Flinders University

It’s not often you get to cast your eyes on a creature feared to be long-gone.

Perhaps that’s why my recent rediscovery of the native bee species Pharohylaeus lactiferus is so exciting — especially after it spent a century eluding researchers.

But how did it stay out of sight for so long?

A creature overshadowed

Australia is home to 1654 named species of native bee. Unfortunately, these are often overshadowed in the eyes of public by the widespread and invasive European honeybee.

Scientific research on Australian native bees is lagging, compared to many other nations.

With this in mind, it may not be surprising to learn some native species can go unnoticed for many years. Although, when it’s the only representative of a whole genus, one might start to worry about losing something special.

In this case the genus is Pharohylaeus, where “pharo” means “cloaked”, as these bees’ first three abdominal segments overlay the others to resemble a cloak.

I found the cloaked bee P. lactiferus during a major east coast sampling effort of more than 225 unique sites. The discovery, and what I learnt from it, helped me find more specimens at two additional sites.

It also made me wonder why P. lactiferus had been missing for so long. Is it naturally rare, hard to find, or perhaps threatened?

Taxonomic trouble

Many Australian bees are very difficult to identify to a species level. In fact, some might be nearly impossible.

However, P. lactiferus is a relatively distinct black and white masked bee. Masked bees are those from the subfamily Hylaeinae, named so because they often have striking, bright facial patterns on an otherwise dark face.

With this distinctive appearance, identification issues weren’t a contributor to the mystery of P. lactiferus.

Seeing red

Still, despite having sampled extensively across sites and flowering plant species, I only found P. lactiferus on two types of plant: the firewheel tree and the Illawarra flame tree — both of which boast exuberant red flowers.

_Brachychiton acerifolius_ flowers. — The Illawarra flame tree (*Brachychiton acerifolius*).
James Dorey, Author provided

Bees generally don’t see shades of red, so such plants are usually pollinated by birds. It could be that bee researchers tend to avoid sampling these red flowering plant species for this reason.

Then again, bee vision and bee perception are not always the same. And bees are also guided by their keen sense of smell.

Habitat specialisation

So far, I’ve only found P. lactiferus within about 200 metres of one major vegetation subgroup, which is tropical or sub-tropical rainforest.

The first specimens I collected were in Atherton, Queensland. I later found more in Kuranda and Eungella. Some of these specimens are now stored in the South Australian Museum.

The habitat specialisation of P. lactiferus may suggest it has an above-average level of vulnerability to disturbances, particularly if it needs a strict set of requirements to make it through its entire life-cycle.

It is one of myriad bee species that nest in narrow, wooden hollows. Some bees such as Amphylaeus morosus dig these themselves and may require specific plant species to make their nest in.

Others such as Exoneurella tridentata need to use holes made by weevil larvae in two particular tree species: western myall and bullock bush.

Rainforests are also notoriously hard to sample. If a bee species spends much of its time in the high canopy, finding it would be difficult.

That said, two early collectors managed to find six specimens of P. lactiferus between 1900 and 1923. So its rarity doesn’t necessarily come down to it being a canopy-dweller.

Potential threats

We know in the bioregions where P. lactiferus has been found that rainforests have undergone both habitat destruction and fragmentation since European colonisation. This threat hasn’t abated and Queensland is still a land-clearing hotspot.

We also know these rainforests burnt across Queensland every year between 1988 and 2016. The 2019-20 black summer megafires burnt nearly double the area of any previous year.

For some bee species this may not be a problem. But for a species that potentially requires specific foods, habitats and even other species, it could mean local extinction.

Only so many populations of a single species can disappear, before there are none left.

Where does this leave us?

P. lactiferus persists, which is wonderful. Unfortunately, we can’t yet say whether or not it is threatened.

To determine this confidently would require a robust, extensive and targeted survey regime.

We may not be able to undertake such a regime for all 1654 of the named bee species in Australia. But perhaps we could make that effort for the country’s only cloaked bee.

James B. Dorey, PhD Candidate, Flinders University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

The way we see influences what we choose

The Australian case study

Measuring flower colours

Generalisation or specialisation?

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A well-armed predator stirs in the night

A frightful discovery

Restoration and recovery

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Sunshiney daze

How bees use flower surfaces

Flowers cater to a bee’s needs

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Connecting habitats

Insights for Australia

Policies overlook lone trees

Helping your local wildlife

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Australia: a biodiversity hotspot

Mind the knowledge gap

Mission possible

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Feeling the heat

A focus on flies

What does all this mean?

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What floods do to ecosystems

Some invertebrates will boom; others may plummet

What to do with the extra house guests?

Don’t sweat the small stuff

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A creature overshadowed

Taxonomic trouble

Seeing red

Habitat specialisation

Potential threats

Where does this leave us?

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