Chapter One

Box 1: The Lonsdorf Model

This model starts with a landcover map of the studied ecosystem. The first step of the modeling
process is to transform this map into a gridded landcover map (Figure 1.5). At the same time, we
need to evaluate the capacity of each habitat in the ecosystems to supply foraging and nesting
resources for bees. For this evaluation it is assumed that each habitat is homogeneous in the supply
of nesting and foraging resources.

Land cover map Gridded map

Habitat evaluations
1 2 3 4 5

A
Habitat Habitat Nest. Forag.
B
j1 j1 0.3 0.8
C
j2 j2 0.1 0.8
D
j3 j3 0.6 0.1
E

Figure 1.5. Graphical representation of the data preparation for carrying out the Lonsdorf model.

This evaluation is made by local experts on pollinators and produce scores between 1 and 0, with a
value of 1 indicating that the habitat supplies a particular resource in abundance and high quality,
whereas a value of 0 indicates that the resource is poor and scarce. Given the differences between
bees, scores are provided independently for each species (or guilds of bees) depending on their
individual preferences. Besides this, scores are also defined by seasons, depending on the temporal
activity of the bee and the seasonal availability of resources in the habitat.
Based on these nesting suitability and foraging affinity scores, the following step is to create a heat
map of the relative density of bee species , nesting on each cell of the gridded map. The value
of is obtained from the multiplication of the nesting potential in cell for bee , and the
amount of floral resource accessible by bee from cell :
Equation 1.1

The term is equivalent to the nesting suitability score in cell . However, depending on
the resolution of the gridded map, cell can contain more than one habitat, hence having multiple
. In such case, is defined by:

Equation 1.2

Equation 1.2 adds the relative contribution of each habitat present in the cell. The relative
contribution of each habitat is estimated multiplying the proportion of each habitat in the cell
by the corresponding nesting suitability score of the habitat (Figure 1.6). Equation 1.2 can also

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 Chapter One

be used when the resolution of the gridded map is sufficiently high to assign a single habitat to each
cell in the gridded map because in such case the value of becomes 1.

Cell =A1
1
Gridded map
1 2 A

1 2 3 4 5
A Habitat Habitat A
1
j1 j1 0.3 0.27 B
1
C
j2 j2 0.1 0.05 A
D
B j3 j3 0.6 0.12 0
E
= 0.44

Figure 1.6. Estimation of and heatmap with the nesting potential across all cells of the gridded map.

The term in Equation 1.1 represents the total foraging resources accessible by bee nesting
in cell . The value of is obtained by adding the individual contribution of each cell foraged
by bee across all flying seasons . Hence, the term can be obtained from the formula:

Equation 1.3

In this formula, the individual contribution of each foraged cell is estimated by multiplying three
elements (Figure 1.7): a) The proportion of habitat in cell ; b) the foraging score of
habitat in season for species ; and c) an exponential decay function to account for the distance
between cells and . This decay function is weighted using the average flying distance of
bee . By using as a weighting factor, the decay function accounts for the flying capacity of bee
. The value can be obtained from experts in pollinators or derived from literature.

For cell =A1,

Habitat Decay Num.
Gridded map j1 0.8 0.64
1 2 Cell =A2 j2 0.2 0.16 20 0.53 0.67
Habitat =0.8
A j1 j2 0.3 0.24
j2 Cell =B1 j3 0.7 0.07 20 0.20 0.67
B j3 =0.31

Cell =B2 j2 1 0.8 28.8 0.45 0.57

=0.8

= 1.91 1.18

Figure 1.7. Estimation of from all cells surrounding the cell .The illustration only estimates for one
season. Column decay estimate the decay function defined as . Column num. estimate the numerator of
Equation 1.3. The procedure presented here is repeated for each season and resulting values are multiplied by their
corresponding These values are then summed across seasons for estimation of .

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Equation 1.3 normalizes the sum of the contributions from all cells foraged by bee . By doing
this, the value of bee (Equation 1.1) can be compared among bee species with different
foraging ranges. Finally, is obtained by multiplying the value resulting from the normalization
with the relative importance of flying season for species . Since is a relative value
defined for each flying season of bee , the model assumes that:

Equation 1.4

Once has been estimated for all cells in the landscape, the model estimates the potential
pollination service of bee in parcel . The value of is defined by multiplying by an
exponential decay function that accounts for the distance between cells and , and then
summing the resulting value across all nesting cells (Figure 1.8). Then, can be obtained from
the formula:

Equation 1.5

For cell =A1

1

0 Decay

1 Cell =A2 20 0.67 0.2 0.13

Cell =B1 20 0.67 0.4 0.27
0
Cell =B2 28.8 0.57 0.3 0.17
1 = 1.91 0.57

Figure 1.8. Estimation of from all cells surrounding the cell . Column decay estimate the decay
function defined as .

The value of can be added among different bees to estimate the total potential of pollination
services in parcel . This total value is estimated with the equation:

Equation 1.6

Where is multiplied by terms and . Term represents the contribution of bee to

pollination services required by the crop in parcel . Hence, adopts a value of 1 when the crop
in parcel can be pollinated by bee , in contrast adopts a value of 0 if bee does not pollinate
the crop in parcel . Similarly, the term indicates the relative abundance of bee in the
landscape. Equation 1.6 is normalized by the total number of bees that visit and pollinate parcel .

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