Temporal and geographic variation in color for the bee Euglossa championi across southern Costa Rica

Temporal and geographic variation in color for the bee Euglossa championi across southern Costa Rica

Camouflage is essential for the survival of many animals. Changes in the color of an organism’s habitat is associated with selection for colors that more closely match the new habitat1. The destruction of tropical forest changes habitat from primarily green to more brownish. In Central America, destruction of tropical forest is ongoing, and has already left much of southern Costa Rica with only about 15% forest cover. For organisms living in fragmented areas, there may be selection for body colors that match those of degraded habitats (brown), and selection against body colors that match intact forest (green). We characterized color changes over a 9 year span for a species of Euglossine bee that has blue-green, greenish-orange, and orange bodies. We hypothesized that there would be a decrease in the proportion of blue-green bees over time across sites distributed throughout southern Costa Rica