pan-european assessment, monitoring, and mitigation of stressors on the health of bees

On 20 May 2022, the EUobserver published an opinion piece on what still needs to be done to save the EU's bees. The opinion highlighted that one-third of the everyday foods we eat is pollinated by bees and other insects, which are increasingly under threat. And since a high proportion of the threatened bee species are native to Europe or the EU27, Europe has a particular duty to protect them.  What Europe still needs to do to save its bees? In this context, the European...

PoshBee does its best to support sustainable beekeeping and pollination across Europe. However, stopping pollinator decline is a complex objective which requires action on many fronts, including providing updated information on pollinator’s health, monitoring and identifying species in danger, creating national strategies to support the bee sector locally, etc.  Luckily, the PoshBee project is far from being the only one supporting pollinator health. Across Europe, there are many...

Despite potential interactions between stressors, such as pesticides and lack of flowering resources, the impacts of pesticides on bees are generally assumed to be consistent across bee-attractive crops, and pesticides regulatory risk assessments neglect interactions with flowering resources. In a new PoshBee research article, called Flowering resources modulate the sensitivity of bumblebees to a common fungicide, scientists set out to find if the type of flowering resource in fact...

Riddle me this: what is informative and well-prepared, whilst being relaxed and friendly? Apparently, PoshBee workshops are – or at least that’s what the participants in PoshBee’s European Bee Course think. Opening presentation by Prof. Denis Michez. This two-day dedicated training school, organised by UMONS, was held in Mons, Belgium on the 12th and 13th of April 2022. The workshop was open to all and its goal was to build better bee healthy capacity among early...

A lot has happened in the past year. Thankfully, our annual PoshBee Buzz newsletter is here to summarise it all for you. From meetings and podcasts to workshops and scientific publications, you have it all in our latest PoshBee Buzz newsletter. The PoshBee Buzz, volume 4. Download the newsletter here and don’t forget to SUBSCRIBE in order to receive our next issue directly in your

Honey bees collect nectar and pollen to fulfil their nutritional needs. However, pollen can also be beneficial for the mitigation of the harmful effects of the parasitic mite Varroa destructor. Varroa infestations at the pupal stage influence the nutritional status of honey bees, compromising their natural physiological and behavioural maturation. This leads to an accelerated transition to foraging and consequently a shorter overall lifespan for the bee. Fortunately, access to pollen...

At PoshBee, we know that many hands make light work - our project is composed of 43 partner organisations from 14 countries. This diversity contributes to a particular research environment, where each member adds value to the project with their own specific and unique background, capacity and knowledge. In order to highlight the invaluable work done by the different organisations and researchers in PoshBee, we launched a new webpage on our website dedicated specifically to our...

PoshBee wishes you a happy and memorable Easter!

To further support sustainable beekeeping practices, PoshBee has published four new practice abstracts on the European Innovation Partnership for Agricultural productivity and Sustainability (EIP-AGRI) platform. These brief and direct pieces of research information aim to make project results more available to practitioners in order to foster sustainable farming. Beekeeper taking care of his hives. The four new abstracts discuss:  beekeepers willingness to take up new...

In PoshBee, we believe in making research information FAIR (findable, accessible, interoperable and reusable). This is why we strive to make our publications easily understandable and available to all our stakeholders, from researchers to beekeepers. In order to achieve that, PoshBee will develop a so-called Stakeholder summary for each primary research paper produced in the framework of the project. These are either short text-based or graphical summaries, describing the question...

A recent article developed in the framework of PoshBee and published in the Ecology and Evolution open access journal presents a novel automated approach for the assessment of nesting and foraging performance of cavity-nesting solitary bees. Such assessment is essential because it provides valuable information on bee health and is thus relevant for the impact evaluation of environmental stressors. Nevertheless, the effect of different stressors varies between species and depends on traits...

A new research article published in the Proceedings of the Royal Society B journal calls for more research attention to the effects of ‘inert’ ingredients on bees.  Man using pesticides. One of the factors contributing to bee decline is the widespread use of pesticides in complex formulations, which include an active ingredient and co-formulants facilitating its action. When applied to crops, these formulations are then further accompanied by separate products called...

On the 12th and 13th of April, 2022, the University of Mons is organising a free 2-day workshop at Mons, Belgium. The workshop will focus on bumble bees and solitary bees and it will present the new techniques of analysis developed by PoshBee’s researchers. Program  Day 1 (12/04/2022) – Bumble bees:  Introduction to ecology and diversity of bumblebees; Status and trends of bumblebees; Experiments developed in PoshBee....

PoshBee just published a new video on YouTube! In the training video "PoshBee Research: Pesticide risk assessment experiments on wild bee species", Alexandre Barraud, a PhD student from the University of Mons, will not talk about domesticated bee species, but rather about wild bee species. Which, even if you may not always see them, represent over 20 000 species in Europe. These species can be very different in terms of size or colours. They can be solitary or social, they can...

PoshBee just published a new video on YouTube! In the training video "PoshBee Research: Effects of agrochemical-nutrition interactions on bee health in the laboratory", Alexandre Barraud, a PhD student from the University of Mons, gives more insight into bee decline in Europe. It is a fact that several bee species, including crop pollinating species, are currently in decline. Bumblebees, for example, are an important pollinator group, but about one-third of the species is in...

Consortium members, practitioners and other stakeholders of the PoshBee project met up between 11 and 13 January 2022 for the project’s fourth annual general meeting. The three-day-long event hosted by the coordinating institution Royal Holloway, University of London was marked by insightful presentations, vivid discussions and an overview of the project’s developments and future initiatives. The initial format in mind of the meeting was a hybrid conference environment, with five...

MALDI IMS (matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization imaging mass spectrometry) is a powerful technology used to investigate the spatio-temporal distribution of a huge number of molecules throughout a body/tissue section. Like in other animal models, imaging approaches such as this one could be used to assess the impact of health stressors on honeybees. In order to better understand the perspectives of such approaches, a recent PoshBee research paper reported on how MALDI IMS can be employed...

In order to facilitate semi-field and field experiments on honey bees, PoshBee partners proposed a novel integrated system of research equipment.  Study Frame. The system’s main component is the Study Frame (Figure 1). It is constructed so that one or both sides can be fitted with a queen excluder cover held in place with clips. Each side of the top bar is laser-engraved with a unique identifier. Converter Hive. The second important item is the Converter Hive...

PoshBee wishes you a very happy holiday season and a joyful and prosperous New Year!

Beebread is an essential food source for honeybees, bumblebees and solitary bees, which store pollen in their nests. However, this pollen can often be contaminated by pesticides, which also affects the beebread. As a result, contaminated beebread is amongst the main sources of dietary exposure to pesticides across all bee species. Nevertheless, it is still insufficiently analysed despite its ability to store pesticides for long periods of time. Flying bees. In this context, a recent...