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Monkey beetles on the beat: urban monkey beetles reveal opportunities for pollinator habitat management in a South African city
Against a backdrop of global declines in pollinators, evidence suggests that some guilds thrive in urban landscapes and relatively small interventions can provide habitat support in otherwise inhospitable urban landscapes. Despite this knowledge, there is a paucity of research on urban pollinators i...
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| Format: | Thesis |
| Language: | English |
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Department of Biological Sciences
2022
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| _version_ | 1867613259275698176 |
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| access_status_str | Open Access |
| author | Brom, Peta |
| author2 | Underhill, Leslie |
| author_browse | Brom, Peta Underhill, Leslie |
| author_facet | Underhill, Leslie Brom, Peta |
| author_sort | Brom, Peta |
| collection | Thesis |
| description | Against a backdrop of global declines in pollinators, evidence suggests that some guilds thrive in urban landscapes and relatively small interventions can provide habitat support in otherwise inhospitable urban landscapes. Despite this knowledge, there is a paucity of research on urban pollinators in Africa. This gap is noteworthy because Africa is a megadiverse region and southern Africa has three global biodiversity hotspots. This thesis is a first step towards filling the Africa gap. Its ought to do so by investigating urban monkey beetles (Coleoptera: Scarabaeidae: Hopliini) in two ways. Firstly, it relates Hopliini community structure to urban environmental gradients and local habitat composition. This was achieved by using pan traps to sample pollinators at 145 sites during two austral spring seasons in greater Cape Town in 2018 and 2019. The findings are that there were three divergent responses to urban landscape dynamics. 1) Those which exploited the urban environment. 2) Those which did not respond to an urban intensity gradient, but did respond to flower‐richness, 3) Those which preferred larger, less disturbed sites at the edge of the city. Secondly, ways that the management of Public Open Space (POS) and road verges can better support the connectivity of habitats containing endemic geophytes and spring annuals were considered. These flower populations provide breeding and foraging resources to Hopliini and other pollinators. They are an especially important resource to the group who are unable to move through or exploit the urban environment without them (Group 2 above). A mowing suspension was investigated to determine how long the indigenous spring show would take to complete the reproductive cycle and reach seed set. The study took a phenological approach to estimating the duration of the suspension. The findings indicate that mowing should be suspended for spring geophyte patches from the first week of August until after the first week of November. The charismatic Baeometra uniflora can be used as an indicator species for when the season has concluded. Methods of strategic landscaping and interplanting are discussed, noting that the peak flowering season in spring is followed by a lesser abundant summer show. |
| format | Thesis |
| id | oai:open.uct.ac.za:11427/36578 |
| institution | University of Cape Town (South Africa) |
| language | eng |
| last_indexed | 2026-06-10T12:33:17.409Z |
| license_str | Not specified — see source repository |
| provenance_str_mv | Harvested via OAI-PMH from UCTD — University of Cape Town Open Access Repository |
| publishDate | 2022 |
| publishDateRange | 2022 |
| publishDateSort | 2022 |
| publisher | Department of Biological Sciences |
| publisherStr | Department of Biological Sciences |
| record_format | dspace |
| source_str | UCTD — University of Cape Town Open Access Repository |
| spelling | oai:open.uct.ac.za:11427/36578 Monkey beetles on the beat: urban monkey beetles reveal opportunities for pollinator habitat management in a South African city Brom, Peta Underhill, Leslie Winter, Kevin Colville, Jonathan Biological Sciences Against a backdrop of global declines in pollinators, evidence suggests that some guilds thrive in urban landscapes and relatively small interventions can provide habitat support in otherwise inhospitable urban landscapes. Despite this knowledge, there is a paucity of research on urban pollinators in Africa. This gap is noteworthy because Africa is a megadiverse region and southern Africa has three global biodiversity hotspots. This thesis is a first step towards filling the Africa gap. Its ought to do so by investigating urban monkey beetles (Coleoptera: Scarabaeidae: Hopliini) in two ways. Firstly, it relates Hopliini community structure to urban environmental gradients and local habitat composition. This was achieved by using pan traps to sample pollinators at 145 sites during two austral spring seasons in greater Cape Town in 2018 and 2019. The findings are that there were three divergent responses to urban landscape dynamics. 1) Those which exploited the urban environment. 2) Those which did not respond to an urban intensity gradient, but did respond to flower‐richness, 3) Those which preferred larger, less disturbed sites at the edge of the city. Secondly, ways that the management of Public Open Space (POS) and road verges can better support the connectivity of habitats containing endemic geophytes and spring annuals were considered. These flower populations provide breeding and foraging resources to Hopliini and other pollinators. They are an especially important resource to the group who are unable to move through or exploit the urban environment without them (Group 2 above). A mowing suspension was investigated to determine how long the indigenous spring show would take to complete the reproductive cycle and reach seed set. The study took a phenological approach to estimating the duration of the suspension. The findings indicate that mowing should be suspended for spring geophyte patches from the first week of August until after the first week of November. The charismatic Baeometra uniflora can be used as an indicator species for when the season has concluded. Methods of strategic landscaping and interplanting are discussed, noting that the peak flowering season in spring is followed by a lesser abundant summer show. 2022-06-29T13:12:31Z 2022-06-29T13:12:31Z 2022 2022-06-29T12:31:17Z Doctoral Thesis Doctoral PhD http://hdl.handle.net/11427/36578 eng application/pdf Department of Biological Sciences Faculty of Science |
| spellingShingle | Biological Sciences Brom, Peta Monkey beetles on the beat: urban monkey beetles reveal opportunities for pollinator habitat management in a South African city |
| thesis_degree_str | Doctoral |
| title | Monkey beetles on the beat: urban monkey beetles reveal opportunities for pollinator habitat management in a South African city |
| title_full | Monkey beetles on the beat: urban monkey beetles reveal opportunities for pollinator habitat management in a South African city |
| title_fullStr | Monkey beetles on the beat: urban monkey beetles reveal opportunities for pollinator habitat management in a South African city |
| title_full_unstemmed | Monkey beetles on the beat: urban monkey beetles reveal opportunities for pollinator habitat management in a South African city |
| title_short | Monkey beetles on the beat: urban monkey beetles reveal opportunities for pollinator habitat management in a South African city |
| title_sort | monkey beetles on the beat urban monkey beetles reveal opportunities for pollinator habitat management in a south african city |
| topic | Biological Sciences |
| url | http://hdl.handle.net/11427/36578 |
| work_keys_str_mv | AT brompeta monkeybeetlesonthebeaturbanmonkeybeetlesrevealopportunitiesforpollinatorhabitatmanagementinasouthafricancity |