A Rapid Method to Confine and Safely Handle Bees in the Field

Improving understanding of the basic biology and ecology of many insect pollinators, particularly specialist or rare taxa, is a priority for many researchers. As such, there is often a need to temporarily confine field-collected organisms in a non-injurious manner in order to gain information or support additional studies. This protocol represents a thoroughly tested, quick, and inexpensive field method for safely handling bees of conservation concern that can easily be tailored toward specific project needs, including organism identification, pollen removal, marking, and/or collection of non-lethal tissue samples for genetic analysis. This methodology can serve as an additional option in the researcher's toolbox to use when certain scenarios arise. It is anticipated that this methodology can be adapted for use with other insect species as well as used by individuals of varying experience and skill levels. It can be of great value to researchers studying specialist bees or conducting host-specific studies. The data collection made possible by this protocol will be invaluable to help researchers address critical data gaps for many pollinator species, plant-pollinator network structures, and pollinator conservation and management initiatives.