Daniel Paiva Silva

Amazonian species within the Cerrado savanna: new records and potential distribution for Aglae caerulea (Apidae: Euglossini)

Given human-related changes, quality distributional data are required for consistent conservation. Still, the lack of proper biogeographic information is a major setback for many groups. Here, we use new occurrences for Aglae caerulea in the Cerrado to model its potential distribution. We used Maximum Entropy (MaxEnt) and Genetic Algorithm for Rule-Set Production (GARP) algorithms in different modeling runs and both previous and new A. caerulea occurrences to predict this species distribution. Models which used only the previous A. caerulea’s records did not predicted the new Cerrado records, while those where we used the latter did predict the new ones as minimally suitable. A. caerulea distribution significantly increased towards the Cerrado according to both MaxEnt and GARP algorithms. Gallery forests are important dispersal alternatives for several species dwelling the Amazon and the Atlantic forest. Niche models of other rare Euglossini bees are advised to better evaluate their distributions.

Using Ecological Niche Models and Niche Analyses to Understand Speciation Patterns: The Case of Sister Neotropical Orchid Bees

The role of past connections between the two major South American forested biomes on current species distribution has been recognized a long time ago. Climatic oscillations that further separated these biomes have promoted parapatric speciation, in which many species had their continuous distribution split, giving rise to different but related species (i.e., different potential distributions and realized niche features). The distribution of many sister species of orchid bees follow this pattern. Here, using ecological niche models and niche analyses, we (1) tested the role of ecological niche differentiation on the divergence between sister orchid-bees (genera Eulaema and Eufriesea) from the Amazon and Atlantic forests, and (2) highlighted interesting areas for new surveys. Amazonian species occupied different realized niches than their Atlantic sister species. Conversely, species of sympatric but distantly related Eulaema bees occupied similar realized niches. Amazonian species had a wide potential distribution in South America, whereas Atlantic Forest species were more limited to the eastern coast of the continent. Additionally, we identified several areas in need of future surveys. Our results show that the realized niche of Atlantic-Amazonian sister species of orchid bees, which have been previously treated as allopatric populations of three species, had limited niche overlap and similarity. These findings agree with their current taxonomy, which treats each of those populations as distinct valid species.

Biodiversity conservation gaps in the Brazilian protected areas

Although Brazil is a megadiverse country and thus a conservation priority, no study has yet quantified conservation gaps in the Brazilian protected areas (PAs) using extensive empirical data. Here, we evaluate the degree of biodiversity protection and knowledge within all the Brazilian PAs through a gap analysis of vertebrate, arthropod and angiosperm occurrences and phylogenetic data. Our results show that the knowledge on biodiversity in most Brazilian PAs remain scant as 71% of PAs have less than 0.01 species records per km2. Almost 55% of Brazilian species and about 40% of evolutionary lineages are not found in PAs, while most species have less than 30% of their geographic distribution within PAs. Moreover, the current PA network fails to protect the majority of endemic species. Most importantly, these results are similar for all taxonomic groups analysed here. The methods and results of our countrywide assessment are suggested to help design further inventories in order to map and secure the key biodiversity of the Brazilian PAs. In addition, our study illustrates the most common biodiversity knowledge shortfalls in the tropics.

Effects of climate change and habitat loss on a forest‐dependent bee species in a tropical fragmented landscape

Climate change and deforestation are suggested to be the main drivers of decline in pollinators. Forest‐dependent species are expected to be the most affected and Euglossa marianae Nemésio (Hymenoptera: Apidae), an endemic species of the highly fragmented Brazilian Atlantic Forest (AF), is believed to be declining as a consequence of human impact. Over the last 17 years, we carried out field surveys to unveil its distribution, allowing us to investigate the potential effects of global climate change on this species, from the last glacial maximum into the future, using species distribution models. Our main goals were to: (i) identify populations potentially under risk of extinction given future climate change; (ii) quantify the amount of climatically suitable and climatically stable areas for E. marianae within AF; (iii) evaluate the area that are available as natural habitat and under legal protection, in an attempt to indicate priority areas to preserve this species. The most stable areas for maintaining populations of E. marianae were located in southern Bahia and northern Espírito Santo states, a region severely affected by deforestation and with several protected areas. Climate change per se does not seem to be the major problem for E. marianae. It may constitute an indirect problem given the limited dispersal abilities of this species, however. Climatically suitable areas will probably increase southwards in the future, but the extreme fragmentation of AF adds great uncertainty as to whether the species will disperse southwards, to regions such as the ‘Serra do Mar’ in northeastern São Paulo.

Range increase of a Neotropical orchid bee under future scenarios of climate change

Along with other human impacts, climate change is an important driver of biological changes worldwide and is expected to severely affect species distributions. Although dramatic range shifts and contractions are predicted for many taxa occurring at higher latitudes, including bumble bees, the response of widespread tropical species is less clear due in part to scarcity of reliable occurrence data. Newly mobilized specimen records and improved species distribution models facilitate more robust assessment of future climate effects under various scenarios. Here, we predict both current and future distribution of the orchid bee Eulaema nigrita Lepeletier, 1841 (Apidae: Euglossinae), a large-bodied species widely distributed in the Neotropics whose populations within the Amazon region are believed to be controlled by cleptoparasitic Euglossini bees, such as Exaerete smaragdina Guérin-Menéville, 1844 and Aglae caerulea Lepeletier and Serville, 1825. Under both current and future scenarios of climate change, El. nigrita is expected to persist in deforested areas including those that might suffer desertification. While under current climatic conditions this species is not expected to occur in central Amazonia where the forest is still conserved, its range is expected to increase under future scenarios of climate change, especially in areas corresponding to the arc of deforestation in eastern Amazonia. The increase of human-related disturbances in this biome, as well as changes in the relationship of El. nigrita–Ex. smaragdina and El. nigrita–A. caerulea may explain the potential range increase of El. nigrita under future scenarios of climate change.

Forest reserves and riparian corridors help maintain orchid bee (Hymenoptera: Euglossini) communities in oil palm plantations in Brazil

Orchid bees (Apidae, Euglossini) are important pollinators in the Amazon forest. In eastern Brazilian Amazon, secondary forest and pastures are being replaced by oil palm plantations. Here, we tested the role of forest reserves and riparian corridors in maintaining orchid bees. We sampled bees in three different soil-type uses, comparing richness, abundance, and assemblage composition. Estimated richness was lowest in palm plantations than in forest reserves and riparian corridors on diversity of orchid bees. Riparian corridors had the highest abundance, followed by reserves, and oil palm plantations. Bee assemblage also varied with land cover, with the reserves having the most distinct composition. We also identified indicator bees for primary forest. Our results demonstrate riparian corridors and forest reserves can maintain orchid bees in oil palm landscapes.

Delimiting priority areas for the conservation of endemic and threatened Neotropical birds using a niche-based gap analysis

Knowledge of spatiotemporal distribution of biodiversity is still very incomplete in the tropics. This is one of the major problems preventing the assessment and effectiveness of conservation actions. Mega-diverse tropical regions are being exposed to fast and profound environmental changes, and the amount of resources available to describe the distribution of species is generally limited. Thus, the tropics is losing species at unprecedented rates, without a proper assessment of its biodiversity. Species distribution models (SDMs) can be used to fill such biogeographic gaps within a species’ range and, when allied with systematic conservation planning (e.g. analyses of representativeness, gap analysis), help transcend such data shortage and support practical conservation actions. Within the Neotropics, eastern Amazon and northern Cerrado present a high variety of environments and are some of the most interesting ecotonal areas within South America, but are also among the most threatened biogeographic provinces in the world. Here, we test the effectiveness of the current system of Protected Areas (PAs), in protecting 24 threatened and endemic bird species using SDMs. We found that taxa with wider distributions are potentially as protected as taxa with smaller ranges, and larger PAs were more efficient than smaller PAs, while protecting these bird species. Nonetheless, Cerrado PAs are mostly misallocated. We suggest six priority areas for conservation of Neotropical birds. Finally, we highlight the importance of indigenous lands in the conservation of Neotropical biodiversity, and recommend the development of community management plans to conserve the biological resources of the region.

Nesting biology and potential distribution of an oil-collecting Centridine Bee from South America

Despite their relevance for the maintenance of terrestrial ecosystems, important aspects such as the biology and distribution range remain unknown for most species of bees that occur in the Neotropical region. This makes the monitoring of pollinators and the establishment of conservation policies difficult. In this paper, we provide information on the nesting biology and natural enemies of Centris merrillae. Additionally, we provide a potential distribution model based on previously unknown occurrence records that increase the distribution range of this species through northern South America and the Caribbean. The production of such biological and biogeographic information is important to support future field surveys.

Publisher Correction: Biodiversity conservation gaps in the Brazilian protected areas

A correction to this article has been published and is linked from the HTML and PDF versions of this paper. The error has been fixed in the paper.

Reply to Biodiversity conservation gaps in Brazil: A role for systematic conservation planning

Fonseca and Venticinque (2018, hereafter FV) present a critial assessment of a paper in which we attempt to estimate the iodiversity coverage of the Brazilian conservation units (Oliveira t al., 2017). We appreciate their contribution to this important ebate. We have no doubts that conservation planning should be ased on a variety of information sources, including not only the overage of species’ ranges but also the contribution of each area o the preservation of ecosystem services, landscape features and ocioeconomic and cultural aspects. This systematic and integraive conservation planning is certainly a complex process, which equires the contribution of experts from different fields. However, e have shown, in this reply, that our paper (Oliveira et al., 2017) ims to quantify the knowledge and protection gaps of biodiversity n protected areas, not to propose priority areas or to test whether he current proposal of priority areas is efficient. Objectives and the onclusions of our paper. We hope this short response can clarify his debate. FV’s characterizes the dataset analyzed in our paper as “. . .an rbitrary set of widespread, abundant, and nonthreatened species. . .”, nd state that any study like ours should be based on species listed s threatened in red lists. Our study was based on the best database n Brazilian biodiversity we could assemble. We have compiled ata from the literature and scientific collections of a variety of axonomic groups, and the dataset was exhaustively checked for axonomic and geographic accuracy. Thus, it is not an arbitrary et of species, but the most comprehensive database on Brazilan biodiversity assembled so far. We understand the reasons to valuate conservation gaps based only (or mostly) on threatened pecies, but in our opinion such procedure would miss an imporant portion of the Brazilian biodiversity. As we demonstrated arlier (Oliveira et al., 2016). Brazilian biodiversity is incompletely nown and this shortened data on species distribution and natral history are used to assess threat levels. Therefore, we think any species could be currently threatened but not recognized as uch due to deficient data. Arthropods (the largest group of livng forms), in particular, are poorly represented for the production f these lists. Although red lists usually include species classified s “Data Deficient”, we think only a fraction of the species curently known are effectively evaluated for the production of those ists. Thus, restricting our analyses to species officially recognized s threatened could miss a significant portion of the Brazilian bioiversity and bias our results towards better known species. Even n Europe, knowledge of threat status is incomplete, e.g., for bees: