Genus of bees
Plebeia is a genus of mostly small-bodied stingless bees, formerly included in the genus "Trigona". Most of the ~45 species are placed in the subgenus "(Plebeia)" ("s.s."), but there also are four species in the subgenus "(Scaura)". They differ in only minor structural details, primarily of the hind leg, from other genera that were formerly treated as constituents of "Trigona". In some classifications, the genus "Schwarziana" is treated as a subgenus within "Plebeia", but recent morphological analyses indicate that "Schwarziana" is a distinct lineage, while "Plebeia" is paraphyletic.
Due to their small sizes, in Brazil many species are known as "abelha-mirim" (literally "small bee") in Portuguese.
Range.
Species of the genus "Plebeia" occur from Mexico to Argentina.
A few feral colonies of "P. emerina" exist in the United States, the result of experimental imports in the 1950s.
List of species.
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