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ARS Home » Pacific West Area » Logan, Utah » Pollinating Insect-Biology, Management, Systematics Research » Research » Publications at this Location » Publication #262228
Title: Global invasion by Anthidium manicatum (Linnaeus) (Hymenoptera: Megachilidae): Assessing potential distribution in North America and beyond

Author
item Strange, James
item Koch, Jonathan
item Gonzalez, Victor
item NEMELKA, LINDSAY - Utah State University
item Griswold, Terry

Submitted to: Biological Invasions
Publication Type: Peer Reviewed Journal
Publication Acceptance Date: 11/17/2010
Publication Date: 6/22/2011
Citation: Strange, J.P., Koch, J., Gonzalez, V.H., Nemelka, L., Griswold, T.L. 2011. Global invasion by Anthidium manicatum (Linnaeus) (Hymenoptera: Megachilidae): Assessing potential distribution in North America and beyond. Biological Invasions. 13:2115-2133.

Interpretive Summary: The wool carder bee (Anthidium manicatum) is a European native bee that has greatly expanded its global distribution in the last 40 years. The last five years have seen an even more rapid expansion of the geographic range of this species. In 2007 the first of this species were discovered in UT and since then the number of records of this species have grown across the state. We present these records and integrate other unpublished data to describe the current range of this invasive species. We employ species distribution modeling to predict the potential global distribution of this bee. Our model illustrates that the available habitat for this bee to occupy is not yet maximized and that further colonization is expected. Neither temperature nor precipitation appears to be good predictors of the distribution; however, one potential explanation for the rapid radiation of this species is that it is following human development and the planting of European ornamentals in residential landscapes. The species appears to colonize especially well near human habitation and we discuss the implication related to this phenomenon.

Technical Abstract: The wool carder bee, Anthidium manicatum, is the most widely distributed unmanaged bee in the world. It was unintentionally introduced to North America in the late 1960s from Europe, and subsequently, into South America, New Zealand and the Canary Islands. We provide information on the local distribution, phenology and sex ratio of A. manicatum from samples collected in an intensive two-year survey across Utah, U.S.A. using Japanese beetle traps. Anthidium manicatum was detected in 10 of the 29 Utah counties, largely in urban and suburban settings. Combining locality records from literature, museum databases and new records from Utah, we constructed two species distribution models (SDM) to examine the potential distribution of A. manicatum worldwide. The model based on locality records from the species’ native range (native SDM) failed to predict into some areas where A. manicatum has been detected. However, the model based on all known locality records (invasive SDM) suggests that A. manicatum has the potential to invade most of temperate North America, and large portions of South America, Australia, Asia and tropical Africa. The inability for the native SDM to predict suitable habitats in the invasive range of A. manicatum suggests that the bee is not limited by the bioclimatic constraints utilized in the SDM. We discuss the naturalization of A. manicatum in North America, possibly through punctuated dispersal, the probability of suitable habitats across the globe and the synanthropy exhibited by this invasive species.