"Are Commercial Honeybees Making Wild Bees Sick?"

Question

by Berly McCoy

Everyone wants to save the bees. But as populations decline every year, we may be saving them to death.

Human efforts to breed more of these insects in artificial beehives and plant more flowers may seem the obvious way to stave off heavy losses.

New research shows the answer is not that clear cut, because viruses may be spilling over from commercial honeybee colonies into wild bee populations, according to a study from the University of Vermont published Wednesday in PLOS One.

Like honeybees, which are invaluable for agriculture, wild bumblebees also play a significant role in crop pollination. Though people are more familiar with honeybee die-offs — such as with colony collapse disorder — wild bumblebees have been struggling too. A handful of bumblebee species have declined by up to 96 percent in the U.S., according to the National Agricultural Library’s website.

The causes have been largely understudied, although pesticides, infectious disease and shrinking habitat due to climate change have been suspected, said Samantha Alger, an ecologist from the University of Vermont who led the new research.

Filling in one piece of the puzzle, the study revealed wild bumblebees pick up more viruses the closer they forage to managed honeybee colonies. But if bumblebees don’t venture into the commercial hives, how are they picking up viruses?

Flowers have been suspected as reservoirs for bee viruses, but no researcher had linked virus deposits on flowers to bumblebee infections in the wild until this study. And the results could have implications for how we lend our inter-species help.

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Answer 1

The article "Are Commercial Honeybees Making Wild Bees Sick?" by Berly McCoy highlights the growing concern regarding the impact of commercial honeybee populations on the health of wild bee species, specifically focusing on wild bumblebees. While efforts to support bee populations through artificial breeding and planting flowering plants seem beneficial, recent research from the University of Vermont suggests a more complicated reality.

The study reveals that viruses may be transferring from commercial honeybee colonies to wild bumblebee populations, particularly when bumblebees forage close to managed honeybee hives. Interestingly, this raises the question of how bumblebees can contract these viruses if they are not directly interacting with the honeybee colonies. The research points to flowers as potential reservoirs for these viruses, establishing a link between virus contamination on flowers and subsequent infections in wild bumblebees.

This information is significant as it underscores the complex interdependence between managed and wild bee populations and may influence future conservation strategies. The findings suggest that our approaches to saving bee populations must be carefully considered to avoid inadvertently spreading diseases among wild bees, which are vital for maintaining biodiversity and supporting agricultural systems alongside their honeybee counterparts.