# Old Study on Solitary Bee Obligate Mutualism?



## AR1 (Feb 5, 2017)

Wow that sounds cool. I hope someone comes up with the paper, I'd like to read it.


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## Phoebee (Jan 29, 2014)

I've not found the paper on the pollen swap experiment, but did find one done in 2020 by Fowler and Droege. Sam Droege is a legend around my parts for his extensive knowledge of native bees and his collection of public domain photographs of them. 

The term we're looking for is "oligolectic bees." 

"Roughly 25% of the ~770 species of bees native to the Eastern United States are pollen specialists. Pollen specialist bees evolved a _continuum_ of facultative or obligate associations with flowering host plants or _pollenizers_ (Cane & Sipes 2006; Hurd _et al._ 1980; Linsley & MacSwain 1958; Robertson 1925; Wright 2018). _Oligolectic bees_ or _oligoleges_ collect pollen from one family or a few related genera of plants and _monolectic bees_ or _monoleges_ gather pollen from a single plant genus or species, while _polylectic bees_ or _polyleges_ forage pollen from unrelated plants (Cane 2020; Cane & Sipes 2006; Robertson 1925)."






Pollen Specialist Bees of the Eastern United States







 jarrodfowler.com


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