TY - JOUR

T1 - Unveiling cryptic species of the bumblebee subgenus Bombus s. str. worldwide with COI barcodes (Hymenoptera: Apidae)

AU - Williams, Paul H.

AU - Brown, Mark J.F.

AU - Carolan, James C.

AU - An, Jiandong

AU - Goulson, Dave

AU - Aytekin, A. Murat

AU - Best, Lincoln R.

AU - Byvaltsev, Alexandr M.

AU - Cederberg, Björn

AU - Dawson, Robert

AU - Huang, Jiaxing

AU - Ito, Masao

AU - Monfared, Alireza

AU - Raina, Rifat H.

AU - Schmid-Hempel, Paul

AU - Sheffield, Cory S.

AU - Šima, Peter

AU - Xie, Zenghua

N1 - Funding Information: Thanks to I. Anagnostopoulos, S. Droege, G. Hancock, R. Hart, M. Kalnin¸sˇ, M. Kuhlmann, T. Levchenko, O. Pryˆs-Jones, H. Schmidt and D. Sheppard, for supplying additional specimens; to S. Belokobylskij (ZISP), F. Gusenleit-ner (OLL), W. Hogenes (ZMA), F. Koch and V. Richter (MHNU), M. Proshchalykin (IBSV), O. Tadauchi (KUK) and J. Thomas (UKK), for loans, duplicates and access to collections; to the Biodiversity Institute of Ontario, Guelph, for extracting and sequencing the samples; to the UK SynTax award scheme supported by BBSRC and NERC for funding the project (PW, DG, MB); to the BMNH for funding a visit to the ZMA (PW); to the Bumblebees of China Initiative (JA); to a Grant of the President of the Russian Federation for young Russian scientist support (MK-5168.2012.4) (AB); to C. Cheetham (Royal Geographical Society, London) for advice on two place names in Central Asia; and to L. Bailey, T. Barraclough, A. Bertsch, A. de Boer, T. Ezard, W. Hogenes, M. Kuhlmann, Y. Linton, L. McNally, T. De Meulemeester, P. Rasmont, L. Rüber, T. Simonsen, V. Smith, J. Stefka and A. Vogler for discussion.

PY - 2012

Y1 - 2012

N2 - Bumblebees of the subgenus Bombus s. str. dominate (or used to dominate) many north temperate pollinator assemblages and include most of the commercial bumblebee pollinator species. Several species are now in serious decline, so conservationists need to know precisely which ones are involved. The problem is that many Bombus s. str. species are cryptic, so that species identification from morphology may be impossible for some individuals and is frequently misleading according to recent molecular studies. This is the first review of the entire subgenus to: (1) avoid fixed a priori assumptions concerning the limits of the problematic species; and (2) sample multiple sites from across the entire geographic ranges of all of the principal named taxa worldwide; and (3) fit an explicit model for how characters change within an evolutionary framework; and (4) apply explicit and consistent criteria within this evolutionary framework for recognising species. We analyse easily-obtained DNA (COI-barcode) data for 559 sequences from 279 localities in 33 countries using general mixed Yule-coalescent (GMYC) models, assuming only the morphologically distinctive species B. affinis Cresson, B. franklini (Frison), B. ignitus Smith and B. tunicatus Smith, and then recognise other comparable COI-barcode groups as putative species. These species correspond to modified concepts of the taxa B. cryptarum (Fabricius), B. hypocrita Pérez, B. jacobsoni Skorikov, B. lantschouensis Vogt n. stat., B. longipennis Friese, B. lucorum (Linnaeus), B. magnus Vogt, B. minshanensis Bischoff n. stat., B. occidentalis Greene, B. patagiatus Nylander, B. sporadicus Nylander, B. terrestris (Linnaeus) and B. terricola Kirby (a total of 17 species). Seven lectotypes are designated. Our results allow us for the first time to diagnose all of the putative species throughout their global ranges and to map the extent of these geographic ranges.

AB - Bumblebees of the subgenus Bombus s. str. dominate (or used to dominate) many north temperate pollinator assemblages and include most of the commercial bumblebee pollinator species. Several species are now in serious decline, so conservationists need to know precisely which ones are involved. The problem is that many Bombus s. str. species are cryptic, so that species identification from morphology may be impossible for some individuals and is frequently misleading according to recent molecular studies. This is the first review of the entire subgenus to: (1) avoid fixed a priori assumptions concerning the limits of the problematic species; and (2) sample multiple sites from across the entire geographic ranges of all of the principal named taxa worldwide; and (3) fit an explicit model for how characters change within an evolutionary framework; and (4) apply explicit and consistent criteria within this evolutionary framework for recognising species. We analyse easily-obtained DNA (COI-barcode) data for 559 sequences from 279 localities in 33 countries using general mixed Yule-coalescent (GMYC) models, assuming only the morphologically distinctive species B. affinis Cresson, B. franklini (Frison), B. ignitus Smith and B. tunicatus Smith, and then recognise other comparable COI-barcode groups as putative species. These species correspond to modified concepts of the taxa B. cryptarum (Fabricius), B. hypocrita Pérez, B. jacobsoni Skorikov, B. lantschouensis Vogt n. stat., B. longipennis Friese, B. lucorum (Linnaeus), B. magnus Vogt, B. minshanensis Bischoff n. stat., B. occidentalis Greene, B. patagiatus Nylander, B. sporadicus Nylander, B. terrestris (Linnaeus) and B. terricola Kirby (a total of 17 species). Seven lectotypes are designated. Our results allow us for the first time to diagnose all of the putative species throughout their global ranges and to map the extent of these geographic ranges.

KW - Barcoding

KW - Bombus

KW - Bumblebees

KW - Lucorum-complex

KW - Pollinators

KW - Systematics

KW - Taxonomy

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84863247111&partnerID=8YFLogxK

U2 - 10.1080/14772000.2012.664574

DO - 10.1080/14772000.2012.664574

M3 - Review article

AN - SCOPUS:84863247111

VL - 10

SP - 21

EP - 56

JO - Systematics and Biodiversity

JF - Systematics and Biodiversity

SN - 1477-2000

IS - 1

ER -