Buffered fitness components: Antagonism between malnutrition and an insecticide in bumble bees

Straub, Lars; Strobl, Verena; Bruckner, Selina; Camenzind, Domenic; Oystaeyen, Annette Van; Wäckers, Félix; Williams, Geoffrey R.; Neumann, Peter

doi:10.1016/j.scitotenv.2022.155098

Cited by 10 publications

(3 citation statements)

References 114 publications

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“…Because of our experimental design, we did not include colony parameters such as colony size, survival or production of reproductives; however, data concerning these traits are available in the literature for various bee species (e.g. [43][44][45][46][47][48][49], or reviewed in [89]).…”

Section: (C) Stress Affects Individual-level and Colony-level Develop...mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Although other stressors such as nutritional stress are usually excluded, bees are challenged by a plethora of stressors in the field and, thus, investigations on a single stressor may not represent real-world field situations. Indeed, recent studies using laboratory and semi-field set-ups have demonstrated that the combined effects of nutritional stress and insecticides exacerbate each other, while high-quality diet buffers and mitigates the effects of insecticides in honeybees [43,44], bumblebees [45][46][47] and solitary bees [48,49].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Land-use-associated stressors interact to reduce bumblebee health at the individual and colony level

Straub,

Birkenbach,

Leonhardt

et al. 2023

Proc. R. Soc. B.

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In agricultural landscapes, bees face a variety of stressors, including insecticides and poor-quality food. Although both stressors individually have been shown to affect bumblebee health negatively, few studies have focused on stressor interactions, a scenario expected in intensively used agricultural landscapes. Using the bumblebee Bombus terrestris , a key pollinator in agricultural landscapes, we conducted a fully factorial laboratory experiment starting at nest initiation. We assessed the effects of food quality and insecticides, alone and in interaction, on health traits at various levels, some of which have been rarely studied. Pollen with a diluted nutrient content (low quality) reduced ovary size and delayed colony development. Wing asymmetry, indicating developmental stress, was increased during insecticide exposure and interactions with poor food, whereas both stressors reduced body size. Both stressors and their interaction changed the workers’ chemical profile and reduced worker interactions and the immune response. Our findings suggest that insecticides combined with nutritional stress reduce bumblebee health at the individual and colony levels, thus possibly affecting colony performance, such as development and reproduction, and the stability of plant–pollinator networks. The synergistic effects highlight the need of combining stressors in risk assessments and when studying the complex effects of anthropogenic stressors on health outcomes.

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Section: (C) Stress Affects Individual-level and Colony-level Develop...mentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Land-use-associated stressors interact to reduce bumblebee health at the individual and colony level

Straub,

Birkenbach,

Leonhardt

et al. 2023

Proc. R. Soc. B.

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Moreover, since workers from the 5th and 6th weeks were in general smaller than workers from the 7th week, it is possible that the pollen diet offered as dry pellets in the laboratory phase had a negative effect on growth. A full four factorial experiment with pesticide and variable food quality (Straub et al, 2022) may help us, in the future, to understand the mechanism through which food quality can offset the effects of pesticides on bees (Klaus et al, 2021).…”

Section: Variablementioning

confidence: 99%

Decreased efficiency of pollen collection due to Sulfoxaflor exposure leads to a reduction in the size of bumble bee workers in late European summer

et al. 2022

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Bumble bees (Bombus terrestris) are important pollinators of wild and crop plants. Despite their importance in the process of fruit and seed production on crop sites, their activity may be impaired due to exposure to pesticides. This species has a yearly life cycle and colony success may rely on effective foraging of workers on ruderal plants late in summer when most crops are no longer flowering. In the current study, we investigated the effect of chronic exposure to Sulfoxaflor on aspects of the foraging behavior of bumble bees and whether Sulfoxaflor influences the body size of workers of B. terrestris in a crop landscape. We found that 2 weeks of continuous exposure to Sulfoxaflor influenced workers’ foraging dynamics and collection of resources. However, there was no evidence that the 5 ppb dose of the pesticide impacted the ability of bees to handle flowers with different traits. Workers from colonies exposed to Sulfoxaflor were smaller. The effect on worker size may be explained as a consequence of the reduced pollen income per unit of worker foraging. Thus, if the effects of Sulfoxaflor applied directly to crops had the same effect as that observed on commercial bumble bees after our chronic exposure, it might negatively impact colony success due to the impact on pollen collection and the reduction in the size of workers.

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Negative but antagonistic effects of neonicotinoid insecticides and ectoparasitic mites Varroa destructor on Apis mellifera honey bee food glands

et al. 2023

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Buffered fitness components: Antagonism between malnutrition and an insecticide in bumble bees

Cited by 10 publications

References 114 publications

Land-use-associated stressors interact to reduce bumblebee health at the individual and colony level

Land-use-associated stressors interact to reduce bumblebee health at the individual and colony level

Decreased efficiency of pollen collection due to Sulfoxaflor exposure leads to a reduction in the size of bumble bee workers in late European summer

Negative but antagonistic effects of neonicotinoid insecticides and ectoparasitic mites Varroa destructor on Apis mellifera honey bee food glands

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