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29 November 2018 A Preliminary Assessment of Bumble Bee (Hymenoptera: Apidae) Habitat Suitability Across Protected and Unprotected Areas in the Philippines
Jonathan B. Koch, David Emmanuel M. General
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Abstract

The Philippines is a biodiversity hotspot and is home to thousands of endemic species, including at least two understudied bumble bee species: Bombus flavescens Smith, 1952 and Bombus irisanensis Cockerell, 1910. Since the 1990s, there have been virtually no studies published on the biology, ecology, and taxonomy of Philippine bumble bees—evidence of the dearth of basic entomological investigations on these important insects. In this preliminary study, our objective is to briefly summarize the geographic distribution of bumble bee habitat suitability (HS) in the Philippines across protected and unprotected areas. Maximum entropy species distribution models (SDMs) of B. flavescens and B. irisanensis were constructed using 19 unique occurrence records and 11 bioclimatic variables to estimate HS in the Philippines. Our SDMs estimated that minimum HS for B. flavescens and B. irisanensis covers ~28,066 and ~24,603 km2 of the 114 protected land parcels in the Philippines, respectively. Across unprotected areas, our SDMs estimated that minimum HS for B. flavescens and B. irisanensis covers ~146,063 and ~156,674 km2, respectively. As predicted, high-elevation habitats have the highest HS relative to low-elevation habitats (r = 0.61, P = 0.003). While our SDMs predicts an extensive distribution of both species across both protected and unprotected areas, it is important to note that nearly 80% of the Philippines is deforested. Our study identifies high-elevation protected areas as places where bumble bees may still thrive, and survey effort should be prioritized to these places to determine the status of Philippine bumble bees.

Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of Entomological Society of America 2018. This work is written by (a) US Government employee(s) and is in the public domain in the US.
Jonathan B. Koch and David Emmanuel M. General "A Preliminary Assessment of Bumble Bee (Hymenoptera: Apidae) Habitat Suitability Across Protected and Unprotected Areas in the Philippines," Annals of the Entomological Society of America 112(1), 44-49, (29 November 2018). https://doi.org/10.1093/aesa/say046
Received: 17 October 2018; Accepted: 30 October 2018; Published: 29 November 2018
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KEYWORDS
Bombus flavescens
Bombus irisanensis
Philippines
Southeast Asia
species distribution model
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