The Sundarbans, the largest mangrove forest in the world and a UNESCO world heritage site has been facing increasing pressure of habitat destruction. Yet, no study has been conducted to test how human disturbances are affecting plant-pollinator interactions in this unique ecosystem. Hence, we aimed to provide the first insight into the impact of habitat loss and human disturbances on the pollinator communities in the Sundarbans. We selected 12 sites in the North-Western region of the Sundarbans, along a gradient of decreasing habitat loss and human activities from forest fragments near human settlements to continuous pristine forest, where we studied insect pollinators of two mangrove plant species, Acanthus ilicifolius and Avicennia officinalis. Our results show that different pollinator groups responded to the disturbance gradient differently. For example, the abundance of Apis dorsata, one of the three local species of honey bees, increased gradually from the village area towards the deep pristine forest. On the other hand, A. cerana and A. florea were found in the village sites and completely absent in the deep forest. Although pollinator community composition changed along the disturbance gradient, their efficacy in pollination did not seem to be significantly affected. However, lower plant diversity and low understory plant cover in the forest patches nearby the village indicated that human disturbances not only affected pollinator community composition but also played a major negative role in the regeneration of the forest. Our study provides first insights into plant-pollinator interactions in the Sundarbans and demonstrates that more research is needed to imply conservation strategies for this unique habitat.

Sundarbans是世界上最大的红树林，也是联合国教科文组织的世界遗产，其面临的生境破坏压力越来越大。但是，尚未进行任何研究来测试人为干扰如何影响这个独特生态系统中的植物-授粉媒介相互作用。因此，我们旨在提供对栖息地丧失和人为干扰对Sundarbans授粉媒介群落影响的第一见。我们选择了Sundarbans西北地区的12个地点，沿着从人类住区附近的森林碎片到原始原始森林的不断减少的栖息地丧失和人类活动的梯度，我们研究了两种美洲红树植物Acanthus ilicifolius和Avicennia的昆虫传粉者。厚朴。我们的结果表明，不同的授粉媒介群体对扰动梯度的反应不同。例如，蜜蜂的三种本地物种之一蜜蜂背蜜蜂的数量从村庄向着原始的原始森林逐渐增加。另一方面，A。cerana和A. florea被发现在村庄站点，并且完全不在深森林里。尽管授粉媒介群落组成随干扰梯度而变化，但它们在授粉中的功效似乎并未受到明显影响。然而，村庄附近森林斑块中较低的植物多样性和较低的林下植物覆盖率表明，人为干扰不仅影响传粉媒介的群落组成，而且对森林的再生起了主要的负面作用。我们的研究提供了对Sundarbans中植物-授粉媒介相互作用的初步见解，并表明需要更多的研究来暗示这一独特生境的保护策略。