A spatially extended model to assess the role of landscape structure on the pollination service of Apis mellifera

Apis mellifera plays a crucial role as pollinator of the majority of crops linked to food production and thus its presence is currently fundamental to our health and survival. The composition and configuration of the landscape in which Apis mellifera lives will likely determine the well-being of the hives and the pollination service that their members can provide to the crops. Here we present a spatially explicit model that predicts the spatial distribution of visits by Apis mellifera to crops, by simulating daily trips of honey bees, the demographical dynamic of each hive and their honey production. This model goes beyond existing approaches by including 1) a flower resource affected by the feedback interaction between nectar extraction, pollination, blossoming and repeated visits, 2) a pollinators dynamic that allows competition through short term resource depletion, 3) a probabilistic approach of the foraging behavior, modeling the fact that the pollinators have only partial knowledge of the resource on their surroundings, and 4) the specific and systematic foraging behavior and strategies of Apis mellifera at the moment of choosing foraging sites, as opposed to those adopted by solitary and wild pollinators. With a balance between simplicity and realism we show the importance of keeping a minimal fraction of natural habitat in an agricultural landscape. We also evaluate the effects of the landscape's structure on pollination, and demonstrate that there exists an optimal size of natural habitat patches that maximizes the pollination service for a fixed fraction of natural habitat.
Comment: To appear in Ecological modelling