- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
This is the last in the series of spring seminars hosted by the UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology. It will be video-recorded for later posting on UCTV.
The squash bee (Peponapis pruinosa) is an important pollinator of squash and pumpkin, Ulmann says. Squash bees collect pollen only from plants in the genus Cucurbita. Like many native bees, they nest in the ground.
"It is well documented that wild native bees can benefit many crops through increased seed and fruit set, thus providing sustainable pollination alternatives in cases of honey bee decline and increased honey bee rental prices," Ullmann said. "Yet, it is unclear how to best manage crop systems to support wild native bees. Research on enhancing wild native bees has historically focused on field border management. However, to ensure the sustainability of a crop-pollination system, a comprehensive approach should also include within field practices."
"Promoting a whole-farm pollinator management strategy is especially important given that agricultural intensification is associated with practices that negatively impact wild native bees. Whole-farm strategies may provide effective alternatives for growers who are slow to adopt resource-intensive, border-management practices. The proposed project will contribute to our understanding of these strategies by determining the impact of tillage practices and crop rotations on a ground-nesting, native bee that is an important pollinator in a specialty crop system."
Ullmann said that cucurbita crops (including squash and pumpkin) rely on pollinators to set fruit. "The specialist squash bee, Peponapis pruinosa, is an important pollinator of Cucurbita and can reduce grower reliance on rented honey bee colonies. In-field management is particularly relevant for this species given that it nests preferentially below its host's vines. I will use observational surveys and manipulative experiments to identify crop rotation schemes and tillage practices that benefit P. pruinosa. These results provide insights into how species persist in agricultural landscapes, with an emphasis on the roles of connectivity and disturbance."
Ullmann, who is expected to receive her doctorate in entomology in September 2014, researches population persistence in dynamic landscapes, and on-farm beneficial insect habitat enhancements. Her interests also include supporting citizen science, translating research related to pollinator conservation and encouraging dialogue between researchers and farmers.
She developed a native bee YouTube channel aimed at providing a direct line of communication between university researchers, farmers and the general public. In addition, she developed the blog Pollinator Farm and associated social media handles on Twitter and Facebook.
Ullmann presented her work at the 2013 UC Cooperative Extension Farmer Workshop, 2012 North American Society for Conservation Biology Annual Meeting, 2011 Entomology Society of America annual meeting and the 2011 Ecology Society of America meeting, and at the 2009 Entomology Society of America annual meeting. She presented a native bee identification workshop for U.S. Forest Service personnel in 2010.
Ullmann served as the 2010 teaching assistant for Introduction to Sustainable Agriculture and has presented at more than 20 workshops on enhancing habitat for native bees around northern California. In 2007, she attended The Bee Course in Portal, Ariz., a 10-day native bee identification field course organized by the American Museum of Natural History. (One of the instructors is native pollinator specialist Robbin Thorp, emeritus professor of entomology at UC Davis.)
She has served as a volunteer with the Student and Landowner Education and Watershed Stewardship (SLEWS) Center for Land-Based Learning program and U.S. Fish and Wildlife RESTORE. Both programs aim to engage youth by restoring native bee habitat on farms and schools.
Ullmann received her bachelor's degree in biology, with honors, from the University of St. Andrews, Scotland in 2002. She received a graduate student research grant in 2013 from the Western Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education (WSARE) to study “Best Management Practices that Promote Sustainable Crop Pollination: The Role of Crop Rotations and Tillage Depth."
While at UC Davis, she has also received a National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship Program Award, George H. Vansell Scholarship (twice), Teledyne Entomology Scholarship (twice), Jastro Shields Award, and the Robin Magee Memorial Fellowship.
Her publications include:
- Ullmann, K. and N. Williams. 2013. Spatiotemporal connectivity explains bee population density in a dynamic landscape. (in submission)
- Ullmann, K. and N. Williams. 2013. Effects of tillage practices on offspring survival of a ground nesting bee. (in preparation)
- Wilkerson, M, K. Ward, N. Williams, K. Ullmann, and T. Young. 2013. Diminishing returns from higher density restoration seedings suggest tradeoffs in pollinator seed mixes. (in review)
- Kremen, C., K. Ullmann, and R. Thorp. 2011. Evaluating the quality of citizen-scientist data on pollinator communities. Conservation Biology. 25:607
- K. Ullmann and N. Williams. 2010. Bringing native bees and forbs back to agricultural landscapes. Native Grasslands Journal. Summer 2010
- K. Ullmann, M. Vaughan, C. Kremen, T. Shih, and M. Shepherd. 2010. California Pollinator Project: Citizen Scientist Pollinator Monitoring Guide. Xerces Society for Invertebrate Conservation, Portland, OR pp 40