Food niche overlap between two stingless bee species along a spatio-temporal gradient: implications for keeping and conservation

Abstract It is common practice that local stingless beekeepers in Southern Mexico keep their colonies, from two or more species, in a single place, referred to as meliponary. Little is known, however, if such scheme promotes competition for local resources among managed species. This is particularly relevant since in some cases over several dozens of hives are reared in one meliponary. In this study we examined the plant species visited by two culturally and economically important stingless bee species commonly kept together, Scaptotrigona mexicana and Tetragonisca angustula , in order to know the magnitude of the competition between them. Honey samples from managed colonies located in three meliponaries were collected during a year. Using standard melissopalynological techniques we analyzed them and could identify the plant species the colonies collected food from. Overall 84 pollen types were identified: 34 at the species level, 32 at the genus level and 18 at the family level. Samples of both bee species had high indexes of plant diversity; Compositae, Leguminosae and Euphorbiaceae were the most visited plant families. Niche overlap analysis showed that up to 21% of plant species were common to both bee species, but only in some months of the year. The results of this study show low competition between S. mexicana and T. angustula . With these results we provide Mexican stingless beekeepers with valuable information that supports the continuation of ancient bee management practices.