A Framework for Melittology

摘要

Bees are the pollinators of most flowering plants, the spore dispersers for many fungi, winged invaders of continents due to human manipulation, and understated butterflies to the naturalists who inspect and explore their beauty. The 20,000 to 30,000 extant species are descended from solitary wasps that largely abandoned feeding on insects and spiders in favor of pollen as a protein source. They share an extensive evolutionary history with ants and wasps, and like those groups they are the subject of a voluminous literature.