Local and landscape factors differently influence health and pollination services in two important pollinator groups.

Abstract

Agricultural management significantly affects insects, especially pollinators, which are crucial for crop pollination and biodiversity. In agricultural landscapes, various factors spanning different spatial scales are known to affect pollinator health, which, in turn, can influence pollination services. However, the importance of these factors in driving the health and performance of different pollinator groups remains unclear. Using a long-term biodiversity research platform, the German Biodiversity Exploratories, we investigated links between local and landscape-level land-use, health and pollination services in common pollinators, the bumblebee Bombus lapidarius and the syrphid fly Episyrphus balteatus, by measuring various traits as proxies for pollinator health and pollination services. Because of their different life histories, we expected the territorial bumblebees to be more vulnerable to land-use intensification at both spatial levels, compared with the migratory syrphid flies. Both land-use and environmental factors (climate) across spatial scales affected pollinator health, mostly via changes in body size: High land-use intensity reduced bumblebee body size, whereas higher ambient air temperature decreased syrphid fly body size. Increasing proportions of intensively managed areas at the landscape level decreased viral infections in both species. Additionally, landscape-level land-use and climate changed the bumblebees cuticular chemical profile, which is essential for communication in these social insects. Increasing land-use intensity at the local level and higher proportions of intensive land-use at the landscape level both had an indirect negative effect on pollination services in bumblebees via local flower cover and body size. Pollination services in both species were linked to body size. Thus, land-use factors affect pollinator health differently: bumblebees are more vulnerable to local and landscape-level land-use intensification, while syrphid flies are more resilient potentially due to their higher mobility. As pollinator health affects pollination services, our results indicate that land-use intensification poses a high risk to crops pollinated by species with small home ranges.