Beescape

Get a bee's eye view of your landscape

Learn to use Beescape
Introduction
Instructional Video
Guided Walkthrough
Tools, Graphs & Features
About Beescape

Beescape is a web-based tool developed by Penn State University to help beekeepers, gardeners, urban planners, growers, researchers, and land managers assess the quality of their landscapes for supporting bees and other pollinators. Bees can fly up to 3 miles (5 kilometers) from their nest to find food, and Beescape provides an easy way for you to explore the landscapes surrounding your location.

Launch Beescape View the FAQ

Watch our instructional video:

Guided Walkthrough

These step-by-step instructions help you become familiar with Beescape. You can use Beescape to investigate factors related to pollinator health in your local area or geographical area of interest.

1. Open Beescape.

This link opens Beescape in a new browser tab so that you can alternate your view between Beescape and this guide.

Screenshot of "centre hall" entered into search box of Beescape and autocomplete options showing "Centre Hall, PA, USA"

2. Enter a location.

On the left side of the screen, find the search bar, located under the Beescape logo. Type in “Centre Hall, PA, USA”. You may type the whole name or click the autofill option. Your map view will now focus on Centre Hall, PA.

Screenshot shows tool tip "Draw a point" on selected map pin icon.

3. Select the Point tool.

Locate the Point tool below the search box, on the left side. This tool allows you to "draw a point" on the map.

Screenshot of Beescape with 3 mile land use circle on Centre Hall, PA

4. Move your pointer to the middle of Centre Hall and click once.

This will create a colorful circle that displays land use within a 3 mile range. Once you have clicked with the Point tool to create a colorful circle, take a closer look.

The circle uses different colors to show land use. For example, green indicates forest, pink means the area is developed, yellow for corn, brown for soybeans, etc.

Screenshot of land use graph showing forest and pastures as the top types.

5. View the "Land Use" graph.

The Land Use graph is located in the column on the right side of your desktop screen. Land Use is the second heading. The graph displays the percentage of each major Land Use type for the selected region.

Test your understanding:

What are the top two land uses for this region? Check your answer below.

: Land use data will change over time, but in November 2024, Forest and Pasture/Hay were the top highest land uses for a 3 mile range of Centre Hall, PA.

6. Adjust the range to 1 mile.

Select the Point tool, then select the slider and drag it to a 1 mile range. Then, click on the same location in Centre Hall.

Test your understanding:

The land use graph changes to reflect the use of land within only this 1 mile. How do the top land uses in this area compare to the 3 mile circle? Check your answer below.

: As of November 2024, a 1 mile area in the middle of Centre Hall indicated a higher percentage of developed land and smaller percentage of forest compared to the 3 mile view.

Screenshot of 1 mile of Centre Hall shows more development.

7. View the Habitat Quality Factors chart.

The chart is located at the top of the column on the right side of your desktop screen. The bar chart shows the average score for each factor for the selected region. The small dark mark on each bar indicates how the select region scores for that factor.

Screenshot of Beescape Habitat Quality Factors.

When a score is low, the mark appears over a lighter shade, to the left. When a score is high, the mark appears over a darker shade, to the right. Change the map display from land use to any of these five factors by clicking a radio button.

Test your understanding:

Looking at the bar chart, which of the five habitat quality factors is lowest for the selected region? View this lowest factor on the map by clicking the appropriate radio button. Check your work below.

: You should have selected Fall Floral Resources. Clicking this radio button should display a map of oranges and yellows.

8. Pan to find State College.

You can find locations by panning the map. Using a mouse, pan from Centre Hall to State College by moving southwest, or, left and down. If you can't find it by panning, you can type it into the search box.

Screenshot of map with iNaturalist icons and "eastern black nightshade" plant card.

9. View observations from iNaturalist

In State College, there are many pollinator and floral observations from iNaturalist. These are represented by red-orange insect icons and purple flower icons.

Test your understanding:

Find one pollinator observation and one floral observation in State College.

View of Economic Value of $291,000 and selected radio button.

10. View Economic Value

Use the Point tool and slider to create a 5 mile range centered in State College. Look at the third heading in the sidebar, titled "Economic Value." This number is the estimated economic crop value that pollinators provide to the selected region. You can also click the radio button next to the heading to visualize economic value on the map.

Test your understanding:

What is the economic value for this 5 mile region in State College? Check your answer below.

: Your value will differ slightly based on differences in data input over time and the precise location of your circle, but you should see an economic value near $300,000.

Graph of precipitation for 2023 and 2024 compared to a 10 year average.

11. View Climate Data

Now, look at the fourth heading, Climate. Initially, the tool shows the average, past year (2023), and current year (2024) temperature for the selected region. By clicking the second button, you can also view precipitation.

Test your understanding:

In 2023, which months experience a spike in precipitation compared to the 10 year average? Check your answer below.

: July and August

Congratulations! You've completed an initial walkthrough of Beescape and you're ready to explore your own geographic areas of interest.

: Point Tool

You can select an area of interest using the point tool. Select the range on the sliding scale bar, and drop the point in the middle of your area. Beescape will then draw the range chosen around the center point. If you select 2 miles, Beescape will draw a circle with a radius of 2 miles around your point.

Polygon Tool

You can also select an area of interest using the polygon tool. Click the polygon icon and draw the area of interest on the map.

Habitat Quality Factors

Beescape will provide the landscape quality scores for wild bee nesting habitat availability, levels of insecticide exposure, and seasonal (spring, summer, fall) forage quality. If you hold your cursor over the individual quality score bar, you can see the exact score.

These scores are compared to the average scores found in the north central United States, so you can determine if your landscape is low, medium, or high quality compared to the average for this region.

Economic Value of Pollinators

Beescape calculates the amount of economic value pollinators provide to agricultural crops in your selected area. Some crops, like fruits, depend heavily on insect pollinators. Other crops, such as corn, are wind-pollinated. In areas with more pollinator dependent crops, the economic value provided by pollinators will be higher.

Land Use

Beescape will summarize the land use types in your selected area. If you hold your your cursor over the smaller land use types, the name of the land use category will be provided.

Climate

Beescape will also provide the monthly average temperature and total monthly precipitation for the current year, compared to the 10-year average for your selected area.

iNaturalist Observations

If you see flower or butterfly icons in your area, these represent records in iNaturalist of flowering plants or pollinators (bees, butterflies, flies, etc) that have been observed in the last 31 days. Click these to learn what has been observed, and follow the link to iNaturalist to get more information. You can sign up for iNaturalist to add your own observations.

Base Map

On the lower left corner of the map, there is a button you can use to change the background map features to show the roads or satellite view.

About Beescape

Beescape is a decision support tool centered around pollinator health. This tool uses GIS (Geographic Information Systems) to help predict the resources and threats that foraging bees encounter as they forage in a landscape. This tool is intended to help people learn how to improve their locations to support bees, or help beekeepers select better sites for their apiaries.

The data for the habitat quality scores is based on the Cropland Data Layer (CDL), which is generated by the US Department of Agriculture each year, using satellite images. The CDL predicts the types of crops or other habitats (such as forest) at a 30 m resolution.

The nesting index predicts the availability of nesting habitat for wild bees based on the habitats present. The forage index predicts the amount of flowering plants available in the spring, summer, and fall. The insecticide index summarizes the typical insecticide use patterns for different crops and estimates how toxic these are to bees.

The economic value of pollinators is calculated based on the types of crops in the selected area, how much those crops depend on insect pollinators to produce seeds, fruits, or vegetables, and the average yield/acre and price for that crop.

The climate data comes from the PRISM Climate Group at Oregon State University in the form of monthly average temperatures and monthly precipitation totals. The current year’s data is presented alongside the average values from the previous ten years to help beekeepers account for abnormal weather that may impact winter survival rates.

Beescape was created by a team of researchers with pollinator, statistical and computational expertise. The Beescape tool combines ecological, meteorological, and GIS (Geographic Information System) data from several sources.

Beescape is led by researchers from Penn State’s Center for Pollinator Research, in collaboration with scientists at the USDA-Agricultural Research Service, University of Pittsburgh, Emory University, University of Minnesota, Dickinson College, University of California, Davis, University of Wisconsin, Madison,University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, Purdue University and Azavea Corporation.

Current team members are shown below, and principal investigators are marked with a *.

Penn State University

Christina Grozinger*
Anthony Robinson*
Heather Grab
Darcy Gray
David McLaughlin
Gabriela Quinlan
Lily Houtman

USDA-ARS

Sarah Goslee*
Melanie Kammerer

University of Pittsburgh

Vikas Khanna*
Anais Ostroski

Emory University

Eric Lonsdorf*

Dickinson College

Maggie Douglas

Prestby, Timothy J et al. 2023. “Characterizing user needs for Beescape: A spatial decision support tool focused on pollinator health.” Journal of Environmental Management 325: 116416. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jenvman.2022.116416.

Douglas, Margaret R., et al. "Putting pesticides on the map for pollinator research and conservation." Scientific Data 9.1 (2022): 571. https://www.nature.com/articles/s41597-022-01584-z

Quinlan, Gabriela M., et al. "Grassy–herbaceous land moderates regional climate effects on honey bee colonies in the Northcentral US." Environmental Research Letters 17.6 (2022): 064036. https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/ac7063/meta

Robinson, Anthony C et al. 2021. “Beescape: Characterizing user needs for environmental decision support in beekeeping.” Ecological Informatics 64: 101366. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecoinf.2021.101366.

Kammerer, Melanie et al. 2021. “Wild Bees as Winners and Losers: Relative Impacts of Landscape Composition, Quality, and Climate.” Global Change Biology 27(6): 1250–65. https://doi.org/10.1111/gcb.15485.

Calovi, Martina, Christina M Grozinger, Douglas A Miller, and Sarah C Goslee. 2021. “Summer Weather Conditions Influence Winter Survival of Honey Bees (Apis Mellifera) in the Northeastern United States.” Scientific Reports 11(1): 1553. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-021-81051-8.

Jordan, Alex, Harland M Patch, Christina M Grozinger, and Vikas Khanna. 2021. “Economic Dependence and Vulnerability of United States Agricultural Sector on Insect-Mediated Pollination Service.” Environmental Science & Technology 55(4): 2243–53. https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.est.0c04786.

Sponsler, Douglas B, Don Shump, Rodney T Richardson, and Christina M Grozinger. 2020. “Characterizing the Floral Resources of a North American Metropolis Using a Honey Bee Foraging Assay.” Ecosphere 11(4): e03102. https://doi.org/10.1002/ecs2.3102.

McNeil, Darin J et al. 2020. “Bumble Bees in Landscapes with Abundant Floral Resources Have Lower Pathogen Loads.” Scientific Reports 10(1): 22306. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-020-78119-2.

Kammerer, Melanie, John F. Tooker, and Christina M. Grozinger. "A long-term dataset on wild bee abundance in Mid-Atlantic United States." Scientific Data 7.1 (2020): 240. https://www.nature.com/articles/s41597-020-00577-0

Douglas, Margaret R, Douglas B Sponsler, Eric V Lonsdorf, and Christina M Grozinger. 2020. “County-Level Analysis Reveals a Rapidly Shifting Landscape of Insecticide Hazard to Honey Bees (Apis Mellifera) on US Farmland.” Scientific Reports 10(1): 797. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-019-57225-w.

Beescape is made possible by USDA-NIFA-AFRI (#2021-67021-34146), USDA-NIFA-AFRI (#2018-67013-27538), the Foundation for Food and Agricultural Research (#549032) and the National Socio-Environmental Synthesis Center (NSF DBI 16391 45).

Beescape

Watch our instructional video:

Guided Walkthrough

1. Open Beescape.

2. Enter a location.

3. Select the Point tool.

4. Move your pointer to the middle of Centre Hall and click once.

5. View the "Land Use" graph.

Test your understanding:

6. Adjust the range to 1 mile.

Test your understanding:

7. View the Habitat Quality Factors chart.

Test your understanding:

8. Pan to find State College.

9. View observations from iNaturalist

Test your understanding:

10. View Economic Value

Test your understanding:

11. View Climate Data

Test your understanding:

Point Tool

Polygon Tool

Habitat Quality Factors

Economic Value of Pollinators

Land Use

Climate

iNaturalist Observations

Base Map

About Beescape

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