Of Bees and Birds

by Michaela Hofmann

Supervisor: Prof. Dr. Susanne S. Renner

The Botanical Garden Munich covers an area of 21 ha and houses several thousand species of plants. However, it is also home to a huge number of animals. The garden´s flowers attract many insects, which in turn attract a lot of birds. For my Biology Master I made an inventory of the bees of the garden, finding almost 100 different species, and as a passionate Ornithologist, I also recorded the birds I saw.

The high number of bee species might be surprising, because most people only think of Apis mellifera, the Honey Bee when it comes to speaking about bees. However, there are 571 different bee species known in Germany, with all kind of lifestyles. Most bees live solitary, while the life in states, as known from the Honey Bee, is a very rare strategy. In solitary species each female builds its own nest and cares for its own offspring. The nest can be in the ground (e.g. by bees of the genus Andrena, the Mining Bees), in old wood (e.g. by Xylocopa, the Carpenter Bees), or even in empty snail houses (e.g. by some Mason Bees of the genus Osmia). There are also cuckoo bees, which lay their eggs in the nests of other bee species, just as the Cuckoo does with songbirds. Moreover, bees can have different strategies of foraging, from being highly specialized on one plant to using almost every plant which is flowering.

As interesting as the bees, but usually better known, are the birds. Still there are also many facts to be discovered about these animals. Which are the birds most commonly heard in the Botanical Garden? Which birds are nesting where? When can the different species best be observed? And how can they be identified?

For my final project of the Environmental Studies Certificate Program, I was aiming to provide answers to the questions above and share my knowledge about bees. Thus I designed a website presenting the most remarkable bee species of the Botanical Garden (http://www.botmuc.de/en/bees or http://www.botmuc.de/de/bienen). The work for the bird website is still in progress, but it will hopefully go online as well this year. I also designed signs with information about bees and birds, which can soon be found in the pavilion “Information on biotic interactions” in the Arboretum of the Botanical Garden.

Michaela Hofmann's detailled description of her project as well as the signs she designed can be viewed below.