The study found that climate conditions and soil productivity — the ability of soil to support crops based on its physical, chemical and biological properties — were some of the most important factors in estimating honey yields. Credit: Arwin Neil Baichoo/Unsplash. All Rights Reserved.

By Katie Bohn

UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — Honey yields in the U.S. have been declining since the 1990s, with honey producers and scientists unsure why, but a new study by Penn State researchers has uncovered clues in the mystery of the missing honey.

Using five decades of data from across the U.S., the researchers analyzed the potential factors and mechanisms that might be affecting the number of flowers growing in different regions — and, by extension, the amount of honey produced by honey bees.

The study, recently published in the journal Environmental Research, found that changes in honey yields over time were connected to herbicide application and land use, such as fewer land conservation programs that support pollinators. Annual weather anomalies also contributed to changes in yields.

The data, pulled from several open-source databases including those operated by the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) National Agricultural Statistics Service and USDA Farm Service Agency, included such information as average honey yield per honey bee colony, land use, herbicide use, climate, weather anomalies and soil productivity in the continental United States.

Overall, researchers found that climate conditions and soil productivity — the ability of soil to support crops based on its physical, chemical and biological properties — were some of the most important factors in estimating honey yields. States in both warm and cool regions produced higher honey yields when they had productive soils.

The eco-regional soil and climate conditions set the baseline levels of honey production, while changes in land use, herbicide use and weather influenced how much is produced in a given year, the researchers summarized.

Gabriela Quinlan, the lead author on the study and a National Science Foundation (NSF) postdoctoral research fellow in Penn State’s Department of Entomology and Center for Pollinator Research, said she was inspired to conduct the study after attending beekeeper meetings and conferences and repeatedly hearing the same comment: You just can’t make honey like you used to.

According to Quinlan, climate became increasingly tied to honey yields in the data after 1992.

“It’s unclear how climate change will continue to affect honey production, but our findings may help to predict these changes,” Quinlan said. “For example, pollinator resources may decline in the Great Plains as the climate warms and becomes more moderate, while resources may increase in the mid-Atlantic as conditions become hotter.”

Co-author on the paper Christina Grozinger, Publius Vergilius Maro Professor of Entomology and director of the Center for Pollinator Research, said that while scientists previously knew that many factors influence flowering plant abundance and flower production, prior studies were conducted in only one region of the U.S.

“What’s really unique about this study is that we were able to take advantage of 50 years of data from across the continental U.S.,” she said. “This allowed us to really investigate the role of soil, eco-regional climate conditions, annual weather variation, land use and land management practices on the availability of nectar for honey bees and other pollinators.”

One of the biggest stressors to pollinators is a lack of flowers to provide enough pollen and nectar for food, according to the researchers. Because different regions can support different flowering plants depending on climate and soil characteristics, they said there is growing interest in identifying regions and landscapes with enough flowers to make them bee friendly.

“A lot of factors affect honey production, but a main one is the availability of flowers,” she said. “Honey bees are really good foragers, collecting nectar from a variety of flowering plants and turning that nectar into honey. I was curious that if beekeepers are seeing less honey, does that mean there are fewer floral resources available to pollinators overall? And if so, what environmental factors were causing this change?”

For Quinlan, one of the most exciting findings was the importance of soil productivity, which she said is an under-explored factor in analyzing how suitable different landscapes are for pollinators. While many studies have examined the importance of nutrients in the soil, less work has been done on how soil characteristics like temperature, texture, structure — properties that help determine productivity — affect pollinator resources.

The researchers also found that decreases in soybean land and increases in Conservation Reserve Program land, a national conservation program that has been shown to support pollinators, both resulted in positive effects on honey yields.

Herbicide application rates were also important in predicting honey yields, potentially because removing flowering weeds can reduce nutritional sources available to bees.

“Our findings provide valuable insights that can be applied to improve models and design experiments to enable beekeepers to predict honey yields, growers to understand pollination services, and land managers to support plant–pollinator communities and ecosystem services,” Quinlan said.

To learn more about the land use, floral resources and weather in specific areas, visit the Beescape tool on the Center for Pollinator Research website.

David A.W. Miller, associate professor of wildlife population ecology, was also a co-author on the study.

The NSF Postdoctoral Research Fellowship in Biology Program and the USDA National Institute Food and Agriculture’s Pollinator Health Program and Data Science for Food and Agricultural Systems Programs helped support this research.

We are here to share current happenings in the bee industry. Bee Culture gathers and shares articles published by outside sources. For more information about this specific article, please visit the original publish source: Why are bees making less honey? Study reveals clues in five decades of data | Penn State University (psu.edu)

Links:

Zoom: https://auburn.zoom.us/j/904522838

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/LawrenceCountyextension/

Email: ams0137@aces.edu

The bustling aisles of a grocery store offer rows upon rows of food to choose from. In this space, the freedom of choice appears endless, though insight into where and how exactly a product originates may not be as readily available. Peering beyond the confines of the supermarket’s shelves can reveal the scope of this journey, all the way from pollination to plate.

Across the globe, a little over one-third of food crops and plants are dependent on pollinators for reproduction, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. It’s estimated that approximately one out of every three bites of food individuals consume exist because of such animals and insects — from birds to butterflies, bats and especially bees.

“A large portion of our crops are pollinated by insect pollinators, whether it’s watermelons, cantaloupes, cucumbers, different berry crops and so on,” said Timothy Coolong, a professor in the University of Georgia’s department of horticulture and the program coordinator of Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education. “So not only are they critical for environmental health, but we will not have a crop to sell if we don’t have pollinators.”

Despite the significant impact they have on food production, the landscape and its inhabitants, these insects often go unnoticed. UGA Honey Bee Program lab manager Jennifer Berry attributes this disparity not to ignorance, but simply to a lack of public knowledge when it comes to “how important they are for pollination.”

However, through local beekeepers’ involvement within and across their communities, this knowledge rift is slowly closing. From raising small bee colonies for farmers to purchase in the spring to selling honey at markets, over the past 18 years, Abby’s Apiary has contributed to bridging the gap in food trust and transparency.

Hutchinson poses for a portrait in his backyard workshop in Watkinsville, Georgia, on Oct. 24, 2023. Pictured behind him are the wooden bee boxes he makes. (Photo/Skyli Alvarez)

“[Bees] are one of the very few creatures you can keep that you don’t have to feed,” said David Hutchinson, founder of Abby’s Apiary. “They actually feed you.”

Hutchinson was first introduced to beekeeping when he was a freshman in college. He lived with his great uncle at the time, who laid the foundation for his knowledge and interest in the activity. Though Hutchinson took time away from it for several years, after his first child was born, he decided to revive his beekeeping endeavors, return to his very first honeybee hives and launch Abby’s Apiary, named after his daughter.

For Hutchinson, beekeeping is restorative and recentering.

“I just enjoy beekeeping,” Hutchinson said. “Thankfully, the business side takes care of itself, because there are enough people out there [who] want local honey.”

Abby’s Apiary regularly participates in the Oconee Farmers Market each year by selling honey, and the demand for this versatile condiment is evident. In the Southeast, Georgia is one of the top producers of honey, bringing nearly $9 million into the economy, according to USDA’s 2022 Honey Production Survey.

Florida and Georgia make up more than half off the southeast’s production value for honey. (Source: USDA)

The leading two honey producing colonies in the southeast are Florida and Georgia. (Source: USDA)

Along with Georgia’s substantial honey production, an interest in beekeeping persists. When Hutchinson sells his small colonies each spring, he looks forward to meeting customers, new and old, ranging from gardeners, to farmers and newcomers just beginning to familiarize themselves with backyard beekeeping. As opposed to previous years, “among the general public, there’s a lot more attention paid now to providing pollinators habitats,” Coolong notes.

“There’s been a real blossoming of beekeeping, and I love that, being a beekeeper myself,” Berry said. “The only problem I see is, when we have a lot of people doing something, is there going to be an impact?”

According to Berry, the rise of amateur beekeeping that she, Coolong and Hutchinson note has come in response to colony collapse disorder. This phenomenon occurs when much of a colony’s worker bee population disappears, leaving behind the queen and little else. Berry explains how the disorder can be attributed to viruses brought about by parasitic, invasive mites. A notable instance of this observance took place in 2006 and 2007, affecting bee colonies in over 20 U.S. states. Since then, colony collapse disorder’s impact on colony loss has decreased, though the issue of colony loss remains.

As per Berry, the solution to this disorder is reflective of “the state of [the] industry” at large, ultimately lying in the hands of bigger commercial operations with tens of thousands of colonies. However, this does not mean that independent and amateur beekeepers have no impact on their communities.

“I think one of the challenges with beekeeping is just staying knowledgeable as to what is happening with new diseases or pests,” Hutchinson said. “Management techniques are evolving, [but] if you just say ‘this is the way I’m going to do it’ and you do it that way forever, you may not succeed as a beekeeper.”

When it comes to colony loss, he expresses the importance of continually remaining “connected to research” and the beekeeping community, both of which have helped him prevent infestations of pests and sustain his bees’ wellbeing.

“Every time I walk into a grocery store and I see all of that fruit and all of those vegetables, I’m like, ‘thank God for bees,’” Berry said. “They are responsible for the nutritious food that we eat and the color in our diet.”

Skyli Alvarez and Melanie Velasquez are seniors majoring in journalism at the University of Georgia.

To access the complete article go to; From Pollination to Plate, Bees and Beekeeping Play an Irreplaceable Role in Food Production — Grady Newsource (uga.edu)

We are here to share current happenings in the bee industry. Bee Culture gathers and shares articles published by outside sources. For more information about this specific article, please visit the original publish source: From Pollination to Plate, Bees and Beekeeping Play an Irreplaceable Role in Food Production — Grady Newsource (uga.edu) 

Trisiloxane Surfactants Negatively Affect Reproductive Behaviors and Enhance Viral Replication in Honey Bees

Julia D. Fine, Diana L. Cox-Foster, Kyle J. Moor, Ruiwen Chen, Arian Avalos

https://doi.org/10.1002/etc.5771

Abstract

Trisiloxane surfactants are often applied in formulated adjuvant products to blooming crops, including almonds, exposing the managed honey bees (Apis mellifera) used for pollination of these crops and persisting in colony matrices, such as bee bread. Despite this, little is known regarding the effects of trisiloxane surfactants on important aspects of colony health, such as reproduction. In the present study, we use laboratory assays to examine how exposure to field-relevant concentrations of three trisiloxane surfactants found in commonly used adjuvant formulations affect queen oviposition rates, worker interactions with the queen, and worker susceptibility to endogenous viral pathogens. Trisiloxane surfactants were administered at 5 mg/kg in pollen supplement diet for 14 days. No effects on worker behavior or physiology could be detected, but our results demonstrate that hydroxy-capped trisiloxane surfactants can negatively affect queen oviposition and methyl-capped trisiloxane surfactants cause increased replication of Deformed Wing Virus in workers, suggesting that trisiloxane surfactant use while honey bees are foraging may negatively impact colony longevity and growth. Environ Toxicol Chem 2024;43:222–233. © 2023 SETAC. This article has been contributed to by U.S. Government employees and their work is in the public domain in the USA.

We are here to share current happenings in the bee industry. Bee Culture gathers and shares articles published by outside sources. For more information about this specific article, please visit the original publish source: Trisiloxane Surfactants Negatively Affect Reproductive Behaviors and Enhance Viral Replication in Honey Bees – Fine – 2024 – Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry – Wiley Online Library

• USDA Agricultural Research Service

Honey bees survive winters in cold climates by forming a thermoregulating cluster around the honey stored in the colony. Recent research showed overwintering colony losses are linked to a specific metabolic pathway connected to how bees apportion their energy resources.  Contributed

Agricultural Research Service scientists and their Chinese colleagues have recently identified a specific metabolic pathway that controls how honey bees apportion their body’s resources such as energy and immune response in reaction to stresses such as winter’s cold temperatures, according to recently published research.

That cellular pathway has the strongest connection yet found to the large overwintering colony losses that have been plaguing honey bees and causing so much concern among beekeepers, and farmers, especially almond producers, during the past 15 years, said entomologist Yanping “Judy” Chen, who led the study. She is with the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Agricultural Research Service’s Bee Research Laboratory in Beltsville, Maryland.

The “signaling” pathway governs the increased and decreased synthesis of the protein SIRT1, one of a family of proteins that help regulate cellular lifespan, metabolism and metabolic health, and resistance to stress.

“In honey bees merely exposed to a cold challenge of 28 degrees Celsius for five days, we saw almost three-fold lower levels of SIRT1 and significantly higher levels of colony mortality compared to bees maintained at 34 to 35 degrees Celsius, which is the optimal core temperature of a honey bee cluster inside a bee hive in winter,” Chen said.

The researchers also found that bees under cold stress were associated with an increased risk of disease infections, which in turn led to an increased likelihood of colony losses.

When honey bee colonies were inoculated with the intracellular microsporidia parasite Nosema ceranae, and kept at 34 degrees Celsius, they had a survival rate of 41.18 percent while the mortality rate of the colonies exposed to the cold stress of 28 degrees Celsius for five days was 100 percent.

“So that showed it is primarily cold stress that the SIRT1 signaling pathway is responding to rather than pathogens,” Chen said. “Our study suggests that the increased energy overwintering bees use to maintain hive temperature reduces the energy available for immune functions, which would leave overwintering bees more susceptible to disease infections, all leading to higher winter colony losses.”

Chen points out that research also offers a promising avenue for new therapeutic strategies to mitigate overwintering and annual colony losses. One way could be by increasing the production of the SIRT1 protein by treating honey bees with SRT1720, a specific SIRT1 gene activator being experimentally used as an anti-inflammatory and anti-cancer treatment.

We are here to share current happenings in the bee industry. Bee Culture gathers and shares articles published by outside sources. For more information about this specific article, please visit the original publish source: Metabolic pathway discovered (agupdate.com)

Field pansies (Viola arvensis) growing near Paris produced 20% less nectar than those growing there 20 to 30 years ago, the study found. Photograph: Courtesy of Samson Acoca-Pidolle

Study: Flowers are Starting to Self-Pollinate Due to Fewer Insects

Flowers are “giving up on” pollinators and evolving to be less attractive to them as insect numbers decline, researchers have said.

A study has found the flowers of field pansies growing near Paris are 10% smaller and produce 20% less nectar than flowers growing in the same fields 20 to 30 years ago. They are also less frequently visited by insects.

“Our study shows that pansies are evolving to give up on their pollinators,” said Pierre-Olivier Cheptou, one of the study’s authors and a researcher at the French National Centre for Scientific Research. “They are evolving towards self-pollination, where each plant reproduces with itself, which works in the short term but may well limit their capacity to adapt to future environmental changes.”

Plants produce nectar for insects, and in return insects transport pollen between plants. This mutually beneficial relationship has formed over millions of years of coevolution. But pansies and pollinators may now be stuck in a vicious cycle: plants are producing less nectar and this means there will be less food available to insects, which will in turn accelerate declines.

“Our results show that the ancient interactions linking pansies to their pollinators are disappearing fast,” said lead author Samson Acoca-Pidolle, a doctoral researcher at the University of Montpellier. “We were surprised to find that these plants are evolving so quickly.”

Insect declines have been reported by studies across Europe. One study on German nature reserves found that from 1989 to 2016 the overall weight of insects caught in traps fell by 75%. Acoca-Pidolle added: “Our results show that the effects of pollinator declines are not easily reversible, because plants have already started to change. Conservation measures are therefore urgently needed to halt and reverse pollinator declines.”

The method used in the study is called “resurrection ecology”. It involved germinating ancestral pansy plants from seeds collected in the 1990s and 2000s, which were being stored in the national botanical conservatories. The team compared how four populations of field pansies (Viola arvensis) had changed during this period.

Other than changes to the flowers, they found no other changes between the populations, such as the leaf size or total size of the plant, according to the paper, published in the journal New Phytologist.

If flowers are not likely to attract insects, then a plant is wasting energy making them large and nectar-rich. Previous research has shown the percentage of field pansies relying on self-pollination has increased by 25% over the past 20 years.

“This is a particularly exciting finding as it shows evolution happening in real time,” said Dr Philip Donkersley, from Lancaster University, who was not involved in the study.

“The fact that these flowers are changing their strategy in response to decreasing pollinator abundance is quite startling. This research shows a plant undoing thousands of years of evolution in response to a phenomenon that has been around for only 50 years.

“Although most research has been done in Europe and North America, we know that pollinator declines are a global phenomenon. These results may just be the tip of the iceberg: areas with far greater plant diversity will likely have many more examples of wild plants changing their pollination strategies in response to a lack of pollinators.”

Similar processes can be seen in invasive populations that need to adapt new ecological niches. Populations of foxglove have evolved to be pollinated by bumblebees in Europe. However, 200 years ago they were introduced to Costa Rica and Colombia, and they have since changed the shape of their flowers so they can be pollinated by hummingbirds, researchers found.

Other research shows plants that are unable to self-pollinate go the other way, producing more pollen when pollinators are scarce. Because they cannot resort to other methods, they have to outcompete other plants to attract a shrinking number of pollinators.

Prof Phil Stevenson, from Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, who was also not involved in the research, said it made sense that traits that guide or reward pollinators are likely to change when the number of pollinators drops, especially among species that have the option of self-pollinating.

“This is especially so for reproduction,” he said, “which is arguably the most important living function of organisms and likely the most adaptive trait of all.”

We are here to share current happenings in the bee industry. Bee Culture gathers and shares articles published by outside sources. For more information about this specific article, please visit the original publish source: https://www.motherjones.com/environment/2023/12/study-flowers-are-starting-to-self-pollinate-due-to-fewer-insects/

Whole Foods Market announced a new pollinator policy for its Fresh Produce and Floral purchasing to support pollinators in recognition of the critical role they play in our food system and the environment. The company has long championed pollinator health through its commitment to organic agriculture, which prohibits toxic persistent pesticides.

As part of the new pollinator policy, by 2025, the company will:

• Require all fresh produce and floral growers to implement an Integrated Pest Management (IPM) system, which prioritizes preventative and biological pest control measures and reduces the need for chemical pesticides.
• Prohibit the use of nitroguanidine neonicotinoids (clothianidin, dinotefuran, imidacloprid, and thiamethoxam) in all potted plants they sell.
• Encourage all fresh produce and floral suppliers to phase out the use of nitroguanidine neonicotinoids.

In addition to honeybees, Whole Foods Market recognizes native pollinators, such as bumble bees, wasps, and butterflies, are critical to the food system and an important indicator of biodiversity.

“We understand the important role pollinators play in our food system and, through this policy, will build on our long legacy of supporting biodiversity and pollinator health,” said Karen Christensen, senior vice president, Perishables & Quality Standards at Whole Foods Market. “This is another critical step forward in our journey of climate-smart agriculture as part of our purpose to nourish people and the planet.”

The company engages its foundations and internationally recognized third parties to create campaigns that raise awareness of pollinators and their impact. In addition, its Whole Kids Bee Grant Program helps schools and non-profit organizations receive support for educational beehives and bee programming so students can observe bees up close and learn more about the vital role of pollinators. Since 2014, the Whole Kids Bee Grant program has awarded more than 850 educational beehives to schools and nonprofits with support from The Bee Cause Project.

Whole Foods Market continues to work across the industry to encourage all fresh produce and floral suppliers to phase out the use of nitroguanidine neonicotinoids, which are particularly harmful to pollinators, and pave the way for other solutions. Whole Foods Market suppliers like Rainier Fruit continue to demonstrate their commitment to advancing pollinator health by maintaining 150 acres of dedicated pollinator habitat, in addition to 325 acres of Bee Better Certified® orchard in partnership with the Xerces Society for Invertebrate Conservation.

“Every single piece of fruit we grow requires pollination. We wouldn’t have a crop without honeybees, so pollinator health is of utmost importance for us as farmers,” said Mark Zirkle, president of Rainier Fruit. “We’re appreciative of Whole Food’s advocacy and look forward to continued efforts towards more sustainable agriculture.”

For more information on how Whole Foods Market is protecting pollinators and raising awareness for the critical role they play in our lives, visit https://www.wholefoodsmarket.com/mission-in-action/environmental-stewardship/pollinator-health.

About Whole Foods Market

For more than 40 years, Whole Foods Market has been the world’s leading natural and organic foods retailer. As the first certified organic national grocer, Whole Foods Market has more than 500 stores in the United States, Canada and the United Kingdom. To learn more about Whole Foods Market, please visit https://media.wholefoodsmarket.com/.

We are here to share current happenings in the bee industry. Bee Culture gathers and shares articles published by outside sources. For more information about this specific article, please visit the original publish source: https://media.wholefoodsmarket.com/whole-foods-market-unveils-new-pollinator-health-policy-for-fresh-produce-floral/

Tri-County Beekeepers Association Inc.

“Maximizing Your Colonies Potential”

The 45th Annual Spring Beekeeping Workshop in Wooster, Ohio on Friday and Saturday, March 1-2, 2024 is being planned. As in the past, it will be held at Fisher Auditorium and the Shisler Conference Center on Ohio Agricultural Research and Development Center (OARDC) campus, located at 1680 Madison Ave. (at State Route 302 east and State Route 83) just south of Wooster. Last year, the workshop participants were not only from Ohio but a number of neighboring states.

Keep an eye out for more information!

Survival of NEBs inoculated with one of five treatments modeled using a Mixed Effects Cox Model. Dark lines represent mean treatment survival across replicates, while the shading surrounding the dark lines represent 95% CI. Different letters represent significant differences between treatments (coxme; α = 0.05).

A tale of two parasites: Responses of honey bees infected with Nosema ceranae and Lotmaria passim

• Courtney I. MacInnis,
• Lien T. Luong &
• Stephen F. Pernal

Scientific Reports volume 13, Article number: 22515 (2023) Cite this article

• Metricsdetails

Abstract

Nosema ceranae and Lotmaria passim are two commonly encountered digestive tract parasites of the honey bee that have been associated with colony losses in Canada, the United States, and Europe. Though honey bees can be co-infected with these parasites, we still lack basic information regarding how they impact bee health at the individual and colony level. Using locally-isolated parasite strains, we investigated the effect of single and co-infections of these parasites on individual honey bee survival, and their responsiveness to sucrose. Results showed that a single N. ceranae infection is more virulent than both single L. passim infections and co-infections. Honey bees singly infected with N. ceranae reached < 50% survival eight days earlier than those inoculated with L. passim alone, and four days earlier than those inoculated with both parasites. Honey bees infected with either one, or both, parasites had increased responsiveness to sucrose compared to uninfected bees, which could correspond to higher levels of hunger and increased energetic stress. Together, these findings suggest that N. ceranae and L. passim pose threats to bee health, and that the beekeeping industry should monitor for both parasites in an effort correlate pathogen status with changes in colony-level productivity and survival.

To read the complete research paper go to; A tale of two parasites: Responses of honey bees infected with Nosema ceranae and Lotmaria passim | Scientific Reports (nature.com)

We are here to share current happenings in the bee industry. Bee Culture gathers and shares articles published by outside sources. For more information about this specific article, please visit the original publish source: A tale of two parasites: Responses of honey bees infected with Nosema ceranae and Lotmaria passim | Scientific Reports (nature.com)

by University of Göttingen

Carpenter bees (Xylocopa sp) at Lablab in Bengaluru. Credit: Vikas S Rao

Increasing urbanization worldwide is a growing threat to biodiversity. At the same time, flowering plants are often more diverse in cities than in the countryside. This is due to flowering plants and agricultural crops, which are increasingly being grown in cities. A recent study shows that the interactions between plants and pollinators, which are essential for agricultural production, are surprisingly dynamic.

For example, the plant and bee species involved in pollination vary significantly between the seasons. This was shown by an international research team led by the University of Göttingen. The scientists studied farms that produce vegetables in the southern Indian metropolis of Bengaluru—a classic example of a rapidly growing city in the tropics.

Urbanization intensifies the seasonal differences in plant-pollinator networks, as a comparison of urban and rural cultivation areas revealed. The results were published in the journal Ecology Letters.

To identify influences on the interactions between pollinators and plants, the researchers analyzed 36 vegetable-producing farms in Bengaluru every month for a year. In this way, they covered the seasons that are characteristic of the local climate: the mild-dry winter, the hot-dry summer, and the rainy monsoon.

The farms were distributed along two routes that ran from the city center to the rural villages. The researchers recorded the bee species at each site, the plant species visited by bees, and the frequency of these interactions.

From the data, they identified plant-pollinator networks for each location and each season. They analyzed which factors explain differences in the interactions: the time of year, or the distance from the city center, or the degree of urbanization as indicated by the proportion of “sealed surfaces” such as roads, buildings, or pavements.

“Our study provides new insights into the role of urbanization in the dynamics of networks involving plants and pollinators in the tropics, which have been little studied. This is particularly important as current and future urban expansions are largely occurring in tropical regions, where they are subject to different ecological, climate, and social factors than in temperate zones,” explains first author Dr. Gabriel Marcacci, a former Ph.D. student in the Functional Agrobiodiversity research group at the University of Göttingen and now a postdoc at the Swiss Ornithological Institute and the University of Neuchâtel.

“Our results point to major changes in plant-pollinator networks over the course of the year and to the little-recognized importance of seasonality for the interactions between plants and their pollinators, especially in rapidly growing tropical megacities,” say co-authors Professors Catrin Westphal and Teja Tscharntke from the University of Göttingen and Ingo Grass from the University of Hohenheim.

The research was carried out as part of an interdisciplinary DFG research group that investigates changes in socio-ecological systems at the interface of urban and rural environments in India.

More information: Gabriel Marcacci et al, Urbanization alters the spatiotemporal dynamics of plant–pollinator networks in a tropical megacity, Ecology Letters (2023). DOI: 10.1111/ele.14324

Journal information: Ecology Letters

We are here to share current happenings in the bee industry. Bee Culture gathers and shares articles published by outside sources. For more information about this specific article, please visit the original publish source: https://phys.org/news/2023-12-urbanization-seasonal-differences-plant-pollinator-networks.html

By James Murray

Image from Unsplash

Thunder Bay – Business – Almost everyone loves the taste of honey. In an age where food authenticity is increasingly scrutinized, a lesser-known but significant issue has emerged in the honey industry: honey-laundering. This term refers to the illegal practice of mislabeling the origin of honey or adulterating it with other substances. As consumers, understanding honey-laundering and knowing how to ensure the authenticity of the honey you purchase is crucial.

What is Honey-Laundering?

Honey-laundering primarily involves two deceptive practices:

Mislabeling Origin: Some manufacturers label their honey as being from a particular region or country, often one known for high-quality honey, when it actually originates from somewhere else. This practice is commonly used to circumvent import tariffs or bans from countries with a history of contamination in honey production.

Adulteration: This involves diluting pure honey with other cheaper sweeteners like high-fructose corn syrup, rice syrup, or other sugary substances. Adulterated honey is less expensive to produce but is sold as pure honey, deceiving consumers and undercutting honest producers.

Impact of Honey-Laundering

Honey-laundering not only deceives consumers but also has broader implications:

Economic Impact: It undermines legitimate beekeepers and honey producers who struggle to compete with the lower prices of adulterated products.

Health Risks: Adulterated honey can contain harmful antibiotics or heavy metals, posing health risks to consumers.

Environmental Concerns: Mislabeling origin can mask environmentally harmful production practices in some regions.

How to Ensure You’re Buying Real Honey

Read Labels Carefully: Check for country of origin and ingredient list. Authentic honey should have no other ingredient except honey.

Buy Local: Purchasing from local beekeepers or farmers’ markets can increase the likelihood of getting pure honey. It also supports local agriculture.

Certifications and Tests: Look for certifications like “True Source Certified” which ensure the traceability of honey. Some companies also put QR codes on their products that provide detailed sourcing information.

Price Point: If the price seems too good to be true, it probably is. Producing genuine, pure honey is a labor-intensive process, which is reflected in its cost.

Consistency and Texture: Pure honey tends to crystallize over time, whereas adulterated honey will remain syrupy.

Water Test: Put a drop of honey in water. Pure honey will settle at the bottom, while adulterated honey will start dissolving.

Flame Test: Dip a matchstick in honey and try to light it. If it lights easily, the honey is pure. Adulterated honey will prevent the match from lighting due to moisture from additives.

Trust Your Taste: Pure honey has a complex flavour profile that changes slightly with each batch, reflecting the flowers from which the nectar was harvested.

Conclusion

Honey-laundering is a global issue with significant impacts on consumers, producers, and the environment. By being vigilant and informed, consumers can play a crucial role in combating this practice. Always opt for transparency, traceability, and trustworthiness when it comes to purchasing honey. Remember, choosing authentic honey not only ensures you enjoy a quality product but also supports ethical and sustainable practices in the honey industry.

We are here to share current happenings in the bee industry. Bee Culture gathers and shares articles published by outside sources. For more information about this specific article, please visit the original publish source: NetNewsLedger – Unveiling Honey-Laundering: Ensuring Authenticity in Your Honey Purchase

By Mitch Leslie

Yao honey hunter Seliano Rucunua holds a male honeyguide caught for research in the Niassa Special Reserve in Mozambique. CLAIRE SPOTTISWOODE

When people in the Niassa Special Reserve of northern Mozambique hanker for something sweet, they don’t call DoorDash or Uber Eats. They call a bird. The aptly named honeyguide will lead them to a bee nest so they can harvest the honey. The bird obtains a treat, too—scrumptious wax and bee larvae. A new study suggests this partnership, which occurs in several places in Africa, is even more intricate than scientists thought. People in different regions make unique sounds to summon the birds, and the birds recognize and respond to calls from their local area, researchers report today in Science. The authors say the results suggest humans and honeyguides shape each other’s cultural traditions.

“It’s an elegant study. The results are so clear, and the experimental design is so simple,” says ethologist Julia Hyland Bruno of the New Jersey Institute of Technology, who wasn’t connected to the work.

Scientists have documented just a handful of cases in which humans cooperate with wild animals. For example, in Brazil, Myanmar, and India, people and dolphins work together to catch fish. But the alliance between honey-seeking people and honeyguides in Africa takes collaboration to a higher level. The small, brown-and-white birds are adept at finding bee nests and remembering their locations. “They learn the landscape intimately,” says behavioral ecologist Claire Spottiswoode of the University of Cambridge, a co-author on the new paper. Humans, in turn, chop open the trees where the nests are located and smoke out the furious bees. The two species often split the spoils, but honey hunters sometimes stiff their assistants, destroying the wax so the birds are motivated to look for more nests.

Honeyguides sometimes solicit people to follow them, but honey hunters can also invite the birds to help. The Yao people who live in the Niassa Special Reserve, for instance, make a distinctive “brrrr” sound, followed by a “huh” that rises in pitch.

The sounds people use to draw the birds differ from place to place. Can the birds tell the difference? To find out, Spottiswoode teamed up with anthropologist Brian Wood of the University of California, Los Angeles, who has been studying the Hadza community of northern Tanzania for almost 20 years. The Hadza rely on complex whistles that are, as Wood puts it, “almost like an orchestra of melodies” to notify the birds they are ready to look for honey.

At sites in Tanzania and Mozambique, researchers and honey hunters tramped through the bush playing recordings of the Yao calls, Hadza whistles, or humans yelling their names, which served as a control. In Tanzania, honeyguides were more than three times more likely to hook up with a group playing the Hadza whistles than with one playing the Yao call or the shouts. And in Mozambique, a playback of the Yao call was more than twice as effective as the other two sounds. The researchers ruled out the possibility that the birds opted for a particular sound because it was easier to hear in that environment, determining that the calls and whistles faded equally rapidly in the two locations. The DNA of the birds doesn’t differ from place to place, but the calls can change over relatively short distances, which suggests the honeyguides don’t inherit their preference, Spottiswoode says. A more likely explanation is that “the birds learn to respond to the signals of their local human partners.”

Like humans, birds can have their own cultures, often passed down through their songs. The new findings suggest honeyguides and humans reinforce each other’s traditions. Yao and Hadza honey hunters told the researchers that they stick with the calls they learned from their forebears because changing them reduces the odds of attracting honeyguides. The birds apparently figure out that the call of their area means an opportunity for food, and they are drawn to people making it. But they don’t respond the same way to an unfamiliar call, which discourages honey hunters from innovating. Whether the honeyguides learn to respond to the local call from other honeyguides or on their own is a question the researchers want to investigate.

Yao honey hunters use fire and tools to harvest a bees’ nest in the Niassa Special Reserve in Mozambique. CLAIRE SPOTTISWOODE

“They provide really clear evidence for the interaction between honeyguides and humans and the possibility for learning by the birds,” says behavioral ecologist Mauricio Cantor of Oregon State University, who wasn’t connected to the study. “They’ve done an elegant job of demonstrating that there is cultural variation here,” adds behavioral ecologist Stephen Nowicki of Duke University. Humans cooperate and communicate with domesticated animals all the time, “but this is a wild animal. To see the complexity of communication that can occur—that’s really unusual.” As the authors note, fewer people are hunting for honey because they can now buy sugar. That decline could affect the birds, notes ornithologist John Marzluff of the University of Washington. “If you are a species cooperating with us, you have to be on your game because we change rapidly.”

Humans are making massive changes to the planet and threatening biodiversity, but the birds provide a positive example of an animal that can live alongside people, Wood says. Their “ability to learn opens up possibilities for cooperation and coexistence.”

We are here to share current happenings in the bee industry. Bee Culture gathers and shares articles published by outside sources. For more information about this specific article, please visit the original publish source: Birds that lead people to honey recognize local calls from their human helpers | Science | AAAS

The club partners with other student groups and the DC Beekeepers Alliance

By Kathryn Squyres

AU Beekeeping Society event teaches students about the honey extraction process  IZZY FANTINI/THE EAGLE

Hidden away on the second floor of MGC, American University’s bee hives aren’t a well-known feature of campus. But Perry Heredia, a junior in the School of International Service and the president of the Beekeeping Society at AU, is hoping to change that.

Heredia visits the apiary — the garden where the bees are kept — every few weeks with other students and advisors to inspect the hives. Beyond simply spending time at the hives, she says she has made spreading the word about beekeeping at AU a priority for her time as president.

The club hosts frequent events and partners with AU’s Community Garden and the DC Beekeepers Alliance, with the goal of promoting sustainability on and off campus.

“When I became president, I really wanted to expand Beekeeping’s outreach to be a place for sustainability and environmentalism on campus but also off campus and really do a lot of outreach with the DMV community,” Heredia said. “Just because we’re so privileged to be here and have so many cool resources, so I really wanted to share that.”

Part of this outreach includes encouraging students to take advantage of the DC Beekeepers Alliance’s spring beekeeping course and mentorship opportunities. The course, free for AU students, trains in hive maintenance and allows students to register as certified beekeepers in the District.

“It’s a 12-week course. It’s completely free to AU students, and you register through us,” Heredia said. “You get hands-on experience. You can also get mentee sort of experiences with different beekeepers in the DMV. It’s like my favorite thing ever. The people are so amazing.”

The course teaches beekeeping basics ranging from hive care to bee anatomy. Vice President Naomi Listokin, a junior in the School of Communication who took the course her freshman year, said the course was the first opportunity she’d had to really explore beekeeping.

“We learned all about bees and infections that they get, how to care for them, lifespan, everything. It was very, very interesting,” she said. “And then they offered a build day … [where] they taught us how to build frames and boxes for the hives and that was very cool.”

Back on campus, the Beekeeping Society at AU works with the Community Garden to host events and promote environmentalism. With the Garden set to be cleared for construction next year, Heredia said the groups have been working to find a space that works for both of their needs. Members from the Community Garden also help upkeep the flowers at the apiary.

But the club’s partnerships aren’t limited to just the Community Garden. Last May, the group partnered with over a dozen other student organizations to host the Bee Ball, an end-of-semester celebration with sustainable crafts and other activities.

“Bees are so crucial to our lives in general, like a lot of our food, plants, like a lot of ecosystems, have very different needs,” said Kendall Thayakaran, the club’s inclusivity chair and a junior in School of Public Affairs. “We had Bee Ball last year to kind of provide a bigger sense of awareness in the community. Because we not only do beekeeping but there’s also just like larger responsibilities to the environment and promoting that.”

The club hosts a number of events on its own, including a semesterly honey extraction from the campus hives. Students can participate in each step of the process and even submit labels to be considered for the honey jars. The club then sells some jars to the Davenport Coffee Lounge and auctions off others at events throughout the year.

The club collects its own revenue from honey sales and larger events like the Bee Ball. The revenue helps cover the cost of hive maintenance, but the club donates the remaining funds to the DC Beekeepers Alliance.

Still, the common thread in each of the group’s events and partnerships is the goal to build a supportive community around environmentalism and sustainability.

Listikin says they’ve worked hard to create a “safe and open space” for anyone to come and feel supported no matter how involved they are in the group.

“I’ve never once felt like I have to drop this, like ‘I can’t — this isn’t good for me,’” she said. “This is something I truly, truly do love doing, and everyone is just so understanding, and it really does bring me a lot of joy to see people show up to our events.”

Even with the community they’ve built, Heredia said the group is always looking to expand and reach new people on campus.

“We’ve done a couple just getting advocacy out for beekeeping,” Heredia said. “A lot of people don’t know that there are hives on campus, nor do they know that there’s a community garden on campus, so I think one of our main projects has just been to create awareness and kind of spread the word.”

This article was edited by Maeve Fishel, Jordan Young and Abigail Pritchard. Copy editing done by Isabelle Kravis and Luna Jinks. 

features@theeagleonline.com 

We are here to share current happenings in the bee industry. Bee Culture gathers and shares articles published by outside sources. For more information about this specific article, please visit the original publish source: https://www.theeagleonline.com/article/2023/12/beekeeping-society-at-american-university-buzzes-back-to-life

EPA is issuing this advisory to clarify what pesticide products and active ingredients are registered under Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA) to control varroa mites (Varroa destructor) in beehives, what tolerances or exemptions under Federal Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act (FFDCA) are applicable, and how the Agency views use of unregistered products to treat beehives for one’s own personal use. EPA is also affirming that use of registered pesticides must comply with FIFRA labeling requirements, that pesticide residues in honey must comply with any federal tolerances under FFDCA, and that states may have more restrictive requirements that must be followed as well.

It is a violation of FIFRA if a person uses registered pesticides in a manner that is not in accordance with label instructions. Currently, EPA has registered 16 pesticide products, covering about 10 active ingredients, that can be used on beehives to control varroa mites. In registering these pesticides products, EPA has conducted comprehensive evaluations and determined the products will not cause unreasonable adverse effects to human health or the environment. Using unregistered pesticides could result in a violation of FFDCA, if there are residues in the honey or other edible bee products (e.g., honeycomb, pollen) that are not covered by a tolerance or exemption under FFDCA. The sale or distribution of adulterated honey is a violation of FFDCA.

EPA remains committed to supporting the compliance and enforcement efforts by states with primary enforcement authority to ensure compliance with FIFRA requirements.

• Why is EPA issuing an advisory now?
• What are varroa mites and why are they such a concern for the beekeeping community?
• What does it mean to be a registered pesticide under FIFRA?
• What does it mean to be exempt from the requirements of FIFRA as a “minimum risk pesticide”?
• What does it mean to have a tolerance or tolerance exemption under FFDCA?
• Does an exemption under from the registration requirements under FIFRA automatically mean it is exempted under FFDCA from the requirements for a tolerance, and vice versa?
• Are there pesticides registered under FIFRA that beekeepers can use to control varroa mites in their beehives?
• Are there tolerances or tolerance exemptions set under FFDCA that cover the residues of the pesticide products listed in Table?
• Is it a violation of FIFRA to use a registered pesticide in a manner that is not consistent with its label?
• Is it a violation of FIFRA or FFDCA to sell or distribute food derived from beehives (e.g., honey, comb, wax, propolis, royal jelly, pollen) harvested from beehives treated with unregistered products?
• Is it a violation of FIFRA or FFDCA to sell or distribute the honey or other edible beehive products (e.g., pollen, honeycomb) harvested from beehives treated with unregistered products?
• Are there state pesticide laws that are different from FIFRA that may be applicable?
• What other efforts is EPA engaged in to help beekeepers address the varroa mite issue? 

We are here to share current happenings in the bee industry. Bee Culture gathers and shares articles published by outside sources. For more information about this specific article, please visit the original publish source: https://www.epa.gov/pollinator-protection/advisory-applicability-fifra-and-ffdca-substances-used-control-varroa-mites

With decades of effort toward raising public awareness on the plight of pollinators, we the beekeepers of Vermont are deeply concerned about recent communications from the Vermont Agency of Agriculture Food and Markets (VAAFM), and we would like to set the record straight.

The VAAFM’s claim of record honey bee numbers in Vermont as evidence of a “healthy and robust beekeeping industry” is not only misleading but serves to undermine our industry and ongoing efforts in Vermont to protect managed and native bees, both of whom are in great peril. Contrary to VAAFM’s recent communications, the beekeeping and scientific community agree that the total number of honey bee colonies cannot be used to measure bee health (a honey bee colony is a single family of bees housed in a hive.)

A more accurate estimate of our state honey bee health is annual colony loss. According to VAAFM’s own statistics, Vermont beekeepers have lost at least 25% of their bees during the winter months for the last three years. The Bee Informed Partnership, a national organization that tracks U.S. honey bee colony losses, reports combined summer and winter colony losses for Vermonters much higher at 35-85% each year for the last four years. Vermont beekeepers have maintained colony numbers by becoming bee-replacers instead of beekeepers. When VAAFM takes their tally of Vermont hives each July, beekeepers have already created new colonies to replace their losses. However, this is a very costly and laborious process – one that is not indicative of a “healthy and robust” beekeeping industry.

Not only is colony count the wrong measure of our industry’s health, the numbers themselves are misleading. Non-beekeepers are largely unaware that thousands of Vermont honey bee colonies counted by VAAFM are propagated in the south, trucked to Vermont in early summer, and then moved south again before winter. These imported colonies more than double the Vermont colony count for a short period of time each year.

The apparent increase in colony numbers from 2016-2023 was largely driven by beekeepers registering their pre-existing colonies thanks to the collaborative efforts of the Vermont Beekeepers Association and the VAAFM. The increase in colony numbers during the period presented by the VAAFM represents both a growth in program participation and an increasingly accurate state database.

Across our entire beekeeping industry, annual colony losses are too high and unsustainable. All Vermont beekeepers, including migratory beekeepers, struggle with a high degree of annual colony losses due to pests, pathogens, environmental impacts, and pesticide use. As we continue to confront these challenges, it is disheartening to find that our state agricultural agency has used inaccurate numbers and oversimplification of a complex situation to suggest that bees are flourishing in our state. These inaccuracies undermine the enormous efforts of Vermont beekeepers and the urgency of addressing the very real threats to pollinator health here in Vermont.

Signed,

The Vermont Beekeepers Association Board of Directors

Since 1886 the VBA has promoted the general welfare of Vermont’s Apiculture Industry while sustaining a friendly body of unity among the state’s beekeepers.