Aktivitas Terbang Harian dan Mencari Polen Trigona laeviceps Smith di Perkebunan karet (Hevea braziliensis) dan Kelapa Sawit (Elaeis guineensis)

Abstract

Conversion of forest to plantations affect the stability of ecosystems i.e. food webs and environmental factors. Stingless bee Trigona can be used as a model to understand the land conversion effect. This research were aimed to study daily flight activity of Trigona laeviceps and forage for pollen at oil palm and rubber plantations. Observation of daily flight activity and pollen collection activity of T. laeviceps were conducted in 26 days at oil palm and rubber plantations. The behaviour observations were taken from 05:00 to 18:10 and the observations were clustered into three groups, i.e. morning, noon and afternoon groups. The correlation of environmental effects (temperature, humidity, light intensity) activity to T. laeviceps behaviour were analysed by using Principle Component Analysis and Pearson correlation. The results of this study showed that pollen collection activity of T. laeviceps in oil palm plantations were commenced from 08.00 having peak activity at 12:00 to 12:10 while from 07.30 in pollen collection (peak activity at 12:30 to 14:10) for T. laeviceps in rubber plantation. Daily flight activity and pollen collecting T. laeviceps on each colony, was higher during noon (11:00 to 14:10) compared to morning and afternoon activities. Significant Pearson correlations were observed between environmental factors (temperature, humidity and light intensity) with daily flying activities and pollen collection. However, non-significant correlation occured between temperature and pollen collection activity in oil palm plantation.