DOI: 10.6084/m9.figshare.14732760.v1
title: Bumble bee foraging paths

description: Bumble bee foraging paths recorded in multi-species patches of flowering plants wherein each individual plant was mapped. For each step within each path (i.e., a movement from one plant individual to another), the data file contains a separate row for each plant individual in the patch. Thus, for each step, the data represent all possible choices the foraging bee could have made, and the one choice we observed it to make.<br>Description of each column in the data set:<br>1) <b>step.no</b> - The number of each step within a foraging path at a particular site on a particular date.<br>2) <b>step</b> - The identity of each step, defined by the code assigned to the plant the bee started on and the plant the bee ended on. For example, the step "HA19HA21" indicates that the stepped occurred at site Haynes (denoted by "H") and the bee moved between Astragalus scaphoides (denoted by "A") plant numbers 19 and 21. Other site letters are "A" for site Agency and "R" for site Reservoir. Other plant species letters are "L" for Lupinus species, "P" for Penstemon albertinus, "C" for Castilleja species, and various for Unknown plant species.<br>3) <b>start</b> - The identity of the plant on which the bee started at the beginning of the step. For example, the plant "HA19" indicates that the plant was at site Haynes (denoted by "H") and it was Astragalus scaphoides (denoted by "A") plant number 19.<br>4) <b>end.plant</b> - This column gives the identity of all other plants in the patch that the bee could have visited (excluding the plant starting the particular step).<br>5) <b>used</b> - A 0 indicates that the possible step in that row was not selected by a bee. A 1 indicates the possible step that was selected by the bee.<br>6) <b>site</b> - The names of the three sites used in this study. Exact locations are available upon request from the lead author but are not provided in this data set because the focal plant species, Astragalus scaphoides, is of conservation concern.<br>7) <b>path.ID</b> - The unique path identifiers for each foraging path in the study. For example, H513P2R1O5 indicates the site (the letter "H" denotes the site Haynes; see description of the "step" column for additional codes), the date of data collection (the numbers "513" denotes May 13), the period ("P2" indicates the path was observed in the 2nd period of data collection on that day at that site), the round ("R1" indicates that the path was observed in the 1st round of data collection that season), and observation number ("O5" indicates that this was the 5th bee path observed in that sampling period; paths of non-Bombus bees are not included in this data set).<br>8) <b>end.plant.sp</b> - The species identity of the individual plant ending the step.<br>9) <b>year</b> - The year of data collection (2015 or 2016).<br>10) <b>distance</b> - The distance in meters between the start plant and each other plant individual in the patch.<br>11) <b>cos.turn</b> - The angular difference between the heading of the previous step and the heading of the next possible or observed step. Because no turning angle can be calculated for the first step in a foraging path, we substituted the average turning angle across all paths for the first turning angle in each path.<br>12) <b>constancy</b> - This column takes values of -1 or 1 where -1 indicates that the species of the ending plant of the step is different from the species of the starting plant, and 1 indicates that the two individual plants belong to the same species.<br>13) <b>uqStep</b> - A unique identifier for each possible step. This combines the "path.ID" and the "step" columns.<br>14) <b>distance_s</b> - Standardized values of the "distance" column. Values were standardized by taking the difference between each value of the "distance" column and the mean of all distances, and dividing by the standard deviation of all distances.<br>15) <b>prop_abund_all</b> - The proportion of individual flowering plants in the patch belonging to the same species as the end plant individual in each row.<br> <br><br>