Cheadle Center for Biodiversity and Ecological Restoration

Pollinators are crucial to agriculture and natural ecosystems. As such, it is important to consider how they may be affected by current and future changes in climate. In this study, we focus on the pilosity, or hairiness, of the long-horned bee Melissodes tepidus timberlakei Cockerell, 1929 and how that may inform us on how this species tolerates colder temperatures, and whether pilosity can inform us of body size and age. We hypothesized that (1) Hairier bees are more tolerant to cold temperature (2) hairier bees are heavier (3) younger bees are hairier than older bees (4) bees collected earlier in the year are hairier. Presented at UC Santa Barbara CSEP Summer Research Symposium August 15th, 2023.