Journal
JOURNAL OF ECONOMIC ENTOMOLOGY
Volume 102, Issue 2, Pages 616-623Publisher
OXFORD UNIV PRESS INC
DOI: 10.1603/029.102.0220
Keywords
honey bees; mortality bees; seed-treated maize; pesticides; imidacloprid
Categories
Funding
- Agricultural Department of the Walloon Region [DGA/D31-1090]
Ask authors/readers for more resources
Beekeepers suspected maize. Zea mays L., treated with imidacloprid to result in substantial loss of honey bee (Hymenoptera: Apidae) colonies in Belgium. The objective of this study was to investigate the potential impact of maize grown from imidacloprid-treated seeds on honey bee mortality. A survey of 16 apiaries was carried out, and all maize fields treated or not with imidacloprid were located within a radius of 3,000 m around the observed apiaries. Samples of honey, beeswax, and bees were collected in three colonies per apiary and analyzed for pesticide contain by liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry and gas chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry. We first found significant correlation between the number of colonies per apiary and the mortality rates in an apiary. In addition, this mortality rate was inversely correlated with the surface of maize fields treated and not with imidacloprid, suggesting that this pesticide do not interact with bees fitness. Moreover, a very large number of our samples contained acarcides either prohibited or ineffective against varroa destructor (Anderson & Trueman) (Acari: Varroidae), suggesting that the treatment method used by the beekeepers to be inadequate for mite control. Our results support the hypothesis that imidacloprid seed-treated maize has no negative impact on honey bees.
Authors
I am an author on this paper
Click your name to claim this paper and add it to your profile.
Reviews
Recommended
No Data Available