Common Wild Bees
We collected information on nesting preference, flight season, and foraging distance for these 14 wild bee species commonly found in blooming wild blueberry fields (Bushmann and Drummond 2015) from published scientific literature and expert opinion. This information was input into the InVEST Crop Pollination Model applied to Maine’s wild blueberry production landscape.
While not incorporated into the InVEST Crop Pollination model, bumble bees are very important wild blueberry pollinators. Bumble bee queens, which are the only caste of bumble bee present during wild blueberry bloom, are much larger and can fly much longer distances than the solitary wild bees featured here.
Pictured: orange banded bumble bee (Bombus ternarius)