Assemble your supplies in from your supply box:
Net weather datasheet
net
stopwatch
sterile, snapcap collection vials
insulated fanny pack
ice pack
butterfly box + butterfly envelopes
kestral
flat tweezer
2x thin sharpie(s) and 2x minuten(s)
weather data sheets
gloves
10% bleach squirt bottle
70% ethanol squirt bottle
Plant guide
Collection will occur in rounds of 30-minutes of active sampling for a total of 10 hours of active sampling per site, per visit. A 10 hour period is one sampling round. When you are ready to begin each 30-minutes of active sampling, use your Kestral to collect weather data. On the weather datasheet, each 30-minute interval is called the "net number" within the sampling round. It may take multiple days to achieve enough intervals to obtain 10 hours of active sampling. At the end of a day, use the checklist to check off the number of 30 minute rounds each person did by writing their initials in a box.
Assign each team member a separate subsite (or in the event that there are more collectors than plots, try to evenly distribute the collectors). With each subsequent 30-minute sampling round, rotate your sub-plot chronologically (so if I start round 1.1 in plot HM2, then in round 1.2 I go to plot HM3, and in round 1.3 I go to plot HM1, etc.).
Note: you can only sample when the temperature is between 17-24C and the windspeed is below 2.5 m/s.
Check that your stopwatch is set to Countdown and shows 30 minutes.
Start your stopwatch and begin looking for bees. You will stop the stopwatch every time you catch a bee, and start it again after you have put the bee in a vial and are ready to begin searching for a new specimen (so you are not counting any time to get the bee out of the net, into a vial, or labeled in the sampling time).
If you get pollen all of your hands/the net, re-sterilize everything again. Only bleach degrades pollen, but the ethanol removes the residue.
You should collect any pollinating insect that touches the reproductive parts of a flower within your assigned subsite. This can include bees, flies, butterflies, and wasps (sometimes beetles). For butterflies, use the envelopes located in the butterfly box.
You should ignore any beetles that you know do not pollinate (just sitting in the flower), hemipterans, grasshoppers, ants, ladybugs, spiders, etc. Do not collect an insect if it is just sitting on the petals or leaves --only if it seems to be foraging and actively engaging in pollination.
Once you have a specimen in your net, stop your stopwatch and transfer it into a vial. You should label this vial using your sharpie with the:
subsite number (JC1, HM3, etc.),
your initials, SR and net number (2.4, 3.1, etc.)
the 6-letter code for the flower from which you collected the insect
Make sure to leave enough space for the unique ID number. Please write very legibly on the vials and ensure that it does not rub off when handling. When we add the unique number label, use this time to double-check the information is still clearly written.
7. Store the collected insect in your fanny pack on an ice pack, to keep the insect cool and calm.
If you are not sure about the flower, create a temporary plant code based on the information you know such as color and family (small, white, 5-petals, opposite leaves), then you must write a description of the plant in as much detail as possible, and take multiple photos. Use the Unknown plant datasheet to write the description. Upload the photos to the iNaturalist and to Dropbox labeled with the code you used on vials and the site (i.e., thistle_white_MM. Update the unknown plant datasheet you have an ID from iNaturalist.
A note about flower labeling:
For this project, we use a labeling system for flowers in which we only write the first three letters of the genus and species (so Hymenoxys hoopesii becomes "HYMHOO"). Capitalization and spacing does not matter, as long as you can tell what the 6-letter code is when you copy head labels back in the lab.