How far will a pollinator go?

Assessing the ecosystem services provided by various pollinators

Pollination is one of the most talked-about of the 'ecosystem services', partly because the benefits are clear to economists and other non-biologists. What is less well understood is the spatial pattern of pollination - where do the pollinators of different crops come from? How do the changes humans make to the landscape affect how the pollinators can get around? Systematic reviews have revealed how insects prefer to move through habitats with a similar structure to their main breeding or foraging habitat, but that general pattern may not apply to all species or species groups.

This project will assess the effect of different habitat or environment types on the distance that pollinators such as bees will travel to reach nectar resources. The investigation will be based on a field experiment, where individual plants with prominent, nectar-bearing flowers will be raised in greenhouses then placed in different environments such as gardens, grazed fields, heathland, and industrial areas. Pollinators visiting the plants will be identified and counted.

There is a proposal to create a large UNESCO 'Man and Biosphere' reserve in north Hordaland/south Sognefjord. This area would be one of the first ‘Man and Biosphere’ reserves to incorporate a large industrial installation – the refinery at Mongstad. The area is therefore ideal for studying landscape effects as a wide range of environments from the refinery to the heathland centre at Lygra can be accessed, within an area which may be destined to become a focus for science at EECRG.

The ideal student for projects on this topic will already have at least basic insect identification skills, able to tell hoverflies from bees at a glance. They will be able to do long periods of fieldwork and also be someone who can get along (in Norwegian) with the various landowners and stakeholders we will need to contact. They will need to have a driving licence by the time the fieldwork starts.