Differential effects of agricultural expansion on wild bee taxonomic and functional diversity

Abstract Pollinators, especially bees, are in global decline, threatening biodiversity and food security. While intensive agriculture is a primary driver, its impact on bee functional diversity—particularly in the diverse Mediterranean region—remains understudied. Understanding how natural habitat loss in farmed landscapes affects functional diversity is crucial for developing land management that preserves pollination services. We assessed how natural area proportion affects wild bee taxonomic and functional diversity in apple and sweet cherry orchards in central Chile. Over 2 years, bees were sampled using coloured pan traps in orchards categorized by surrounding natural vegetation. Taxonomic diversity was analysed via richness and composition indices, while functional diversity was calculated from morphological and life‐history traits, analysed separately for males and females. We found that the increasing proportion of natural areas positively affected wild bee taxonomic and functional diversity in orchards. Bee taxonomic diversity significantly increased with surrounding natural area proportion, but functional diversity responses were contrasting between male and female bee traits. In particular, functional homogenization (based on RaoQ) was significantly associated with male functional traits in orchards with low natural areas (%) and, in some cases, functional richness (FRic) increased with more surrounding natural area. We found that bee taxonomic and functional diversity responded differently for apple and sweet cherry orchards. Further, the fourth‐corner analysis showed some sex‐specific and temporal associations between traits and natural areas percentage. Natural areas seem to promote pollinator taxonomic and functional bee diversity in different ways. Sex‐specific trait approaches reveal differential ecological associations. Thus, making future studies include intra‐specific trait variability (like sexual dimorphism) seems relevant and a deeper understanding of how different taxonomic and functional bee diversity aspects respond to environmental filters imposed by natural areas neighbouring crops is needed. Read the free Plain Language Summary for this article on the Journal blog.