Reports of honey bee population decline has spurred many national efforts to understand the extent of the problem and to identify causative or associated factors. However, our collective ...understanding of the factors has been hampered by a lack of joined up trans-national effort. Moreover, the impacts of beekeeper knowledge and beekeeping management practices have often been overlooked, despite honey bees being a managed pollinator. Here, we established a standardised active monitoring network for 5 798 apiaries over two consecutive years to quantify honey bee colony mortality across 17 European countries. Our data demonstrate that overwinter losses ranged between 2% and 32%, and that high summer losses were likely to follow high winter losses. Multivariate Poisson regression models revealed that hobbyist beekeepers with small apiaries and little experience in beekeeping had double the winter mortality rate when compared to professional beekeepers. Furthermore, honey bees kept by professional beekeepers never showed signs of disease, unlike apiaries from hobbyist beekeepers that had symptoms of bacterial infection and heavy Varroa infestation. Our data highlight beekeeper background and apicultural practices as major drivers of honey bee colony losses. The benefits of conducting trans-national monitoring schemes and improving beekeeper training are discussed.
In parts of the developing world, deforestation rates are high and poverty is chronic and pervasive. Addressing these issues through the commercialization of non-timber forest products (NTFPs) has ...been widely researched, tested, and discussed. While the evidence is inconclusive, there is growing understanding of what works and why, and this paper examines the acknowledged success and failure factors. African forest honey has been relatively overlooked as an NTFP, an oversight this paper addresses. Drawing on evidence from a long-established forest conservation, livelihoods, and trade development initiative in SW Ethiopia, forest honey is benchmarked against accepted success and failure factors and is found to be a near-perfect NTFP. The criteria are primarily focused on livelihood impacts and consequently this paper makes recommendations for additional criteria directly related to forest maintenance.
In the Greek territory, the seasonal transfer of hives to new "pastures" was known already since antiquity. From the 18th until the 20th century, migratory beekeeping with traditional hives was ...practiced in many areas of the eastern Greek mainland and on several Aegean islands. This practice was carried out for the following reasons: a) to achieve greater production of bee products, especially honey; and b) for the bee colonies to spend the winter in regions where they would be able to offer a notable production in the following beekeeping season. The ordinary tools used in northern and central Greece as well as on the islands of the northern and central Aegean were upright hives, especially skeps. In the south, migratory beekeeping was mainly practiced with top-bar movable-comb hives and with several types of horizontal hives. Hive transportation took place in the night, usually on pack animals, carriages and boats; in many cases by the beekeeper himself. Migratory beekeeping was well developed on Thasos Island and in the Chalkidiki Peninsula, in both cases with exceptional results. Attica, Boeotia, Euboea, and western Crete were also areas of intense migratory beekeeping.
Austrian beekeepers frequently suffered severe colony losses during the last decade similar to trends all over Europe. This first surveillance study aimed to describe the health status of Austrian ...bee colonies and to analyze the reasons for losses for both the summer and winter season in Austria. In this study 189 apiaries all over Austria were selected using a stratified random sampling approach and inspected three times between July 2015 and spring 2016 by trained bee inspectors. The inspectors made interviews with the beekeepers about their beekeeping practice and the history of the involved colonies. They inspected a total of 1596 colonies for symptoms of nine bee pests and diseases (four of them notifiable diseases) and took bee samples for varroa mite infestation analysis. The most frequently detected diseases were three brood diseases: Varroosis, Chalkbrood and Sacbrood. The notifiable bee pests Aethina tumida and Tropilaelaps spp. were not detected. During the study period 10.8% of the 1596 observed colonies died. Winter proved to be the most critical season, in which 75% of the reported colony losses happened. Risks for suffering summer losses increased significantly, when colonies were weak in July, had queen problems or a high varroa mite infestation level on bees in July. Risks for suffering winter losses increased significantly, when the colonies had a high varroa mite infestation level on bees in September, were weak in September, had a queen older than one year or the beekeeper had few years of beekeeping experience. However, the effect of a high varroa mite infestation level in September had by far the greatest potential to raise the winter losses compared to the other significant factors.
Emerging infectious diseases (EIDs) pose a risk to human welfare, both directly and indirectly, by affecting managed livestock and wildlife that provide valuable resources and ecosystem services, ...such as the pollination of crops. Honeybees (Apis mellifera), the prevailing managed insect crop pollinator, suffer from a range of emerging and exotic high-impact pathogens, and population maintenance requires active management by beekeepers to control them. Wild pollinators such as bumblebees (Bombus spp.) are in global decline, one cause of which may be pathogen spillover from managed pollinators like honeybees or commercial colonies of bumblebees. Here we use a combination of infection experiments and landscape-scale field data to show that honeybee EIDs are indeed widespread infectious agents within the pollinator assemblage. The prevalence of deformed wing virus (DWV) and the exotic parasite Nosema ceranae in honeybees and bumblebees is linked; as honeybees have higher DWV prevalence, and sympatric bumblebees and honeybees are infected by the same DWV strains, Apis is the likely source of at least one major EID in wild pollinators. Lessons learned from vertebrates highlight the need for increased pathogen control in managed bee species to maintain wild pollinators, as declines in native pollinators may be caused by interspecies pathogen transmission originating from managed pollinators.
Precision beekeeping or precision apiculture is an apiary management strategy based on the monitoring of individual bee colonies to minimize resource consumption and maximize the productivity of ...bees. Bees play a fundamental role in ensuring pollination; they can also be considered as indicators of the state of pollution and are used as bio monitors. Beekeeping needs continuous monitoring of the animals and can benefit from advanced intelligent ambiance technologies. The aim of this study was the design of a precision apiculture system (PAS) platform for monitoring and controlling the following environmental parameters: wind, temperature, and relative humidity inside and outside the hive, in order to assess their influence on honey production. PAS is based on an Arduino board with an Atmel microcontroller, and the connection of a load cell for recording the weight of the hive, relative humidity and temperature sensor inside the hive, and relative humidity and temperature sensor outside the hive using an anemometer. PAS was installed in common hives and placed in an open field in a French honeysuckle plot; the system was developed to operate in continuous mode, monitoring the period of 24 April-1 June 2019. Temperature was constant in the monitored period, around 35 °C, inside the hive, proving that no criticalities occurred regarding swarming or absconding. In the period between 24 and 28 May, a lack of honey production was recorded, attributed to a lowering of the external temperature. PAS was useful to point out the eventual reduction in honey production due to wind; several peaks of windiness exceeding 5 m s
were recorded, noting that honey production decreases with the peaks in wind. Therefore, the data recorded by PAS platform provided a valid decisional support to the operator. It can be implemented by inserting additional sensors for detecting other parameters, such as rain or sound.
In this study, migratory beekeeping behavior, which is an important form of beekeeping, has been modeled. Modeling was performed in conditions of Turkey. Modeling was made by considering food sources ...(nectar / pollen) and meteorological variables (temperature, humidity, number of rainy days, number of cloudy days and sunshine duration) for Turkey in which migratory beekeeping carried out in a different form than in developed countries. The main output in migratory beekeeping is honey production. Considering honey production, modeling has been made with the food sources and meteorological variables that have the greatest effect on honey production. Since the data set developed for modeling consists of relatively few samples, the ensemble learning approach was preferred from the machine learning approaches. Random Forest and Decision Tree algorithms, which are among the ensemble learning techniques, were used. As a result, the migratory beekeeping behavior was correctly classified at a rate of 92%. As a result of classification of Turkey's 81 provinces in five different categories, it was concluded that 33 provinces are suitable for migratory beekeeping at different times of the year. These 33 provinces are regions in the “good” and “very good” categories. In the next stage, thematic maps were produced for migratory beekeepers. Maps were produced for each month of the year. Thus, a guidance and information system has been obtained for migratory beekeepers.
•In this study, migratory beekeeping was modeled considering meteorological variables and nectar sources.•Modeling ensemble learning techniques were used.•Modeling was performed with an accuracy of 92%.•As a result of the modeling, practical information is given to the migratory beekeepers with thematic maps for the whole country.
The evaluation of beekeeping management practices (BMPs) is important for beekeepers worldwide because their choice affects health and survival of managed honeybee (
A. mellifera
L.) colonies and ...touches ethical and economic questions. This study focusses on queen excluders, a common hive addition in contemporary beekeeping. Its impacts are controversially discussed but have not been studied scientifically yet. Within a 4-year participatory on-farm experiment, we assessed the effects on colony dynamics in 64 hives in 8 apiaries during one season in Germany using the Liebefeld estimation method. We found no significant deviation for parameters of colony dynamics between hives managed with and without queen excluders. A qualitative decision-making tool (Pugh decision matrix) facilitated concept selection only for specific beekeepers.
The semi-arid region is characterized by high variability in its natural conditions, in addition to long periods of drought and irregular rainfall, and sustainable practices are a way of exploiting ...the potential of this region. In this context, the search for alternatives is the key to living in these conditions. In this situation, beekeeping is a very rich activity when it comes to agribusiness and sustainability, with Brazil being one of the largest honey producers in the world and still having great beekeeping potential to be reached. Even with the natural conditions imposed by the semi-arid region, the potential of beekeeping in production and marketing is proving to be a profitable and sustainable activity for living with such conditions. The aim of this work is to highlight and explore the importance of beekeeping as a sustainable activity. This study describes an experience report during the beekeeping course in the Agricultural Technician course at the Colégio Agrícola Vidal de Negreiros - CAVN (2012.1 to 2013.2), but with a scientific theoretical basis, which is based on data from established works. Beekeeping is an imminent activity to be explored, and it is immeasurable for these producers to constantly seek to improve their techniques, as well as to establish a path of trust with the professional agricultural technicians they work with in this area.
Beekeepers are central to pollinator health. For policymakers and beekeeping organisations to develop widely accepted strategies to sustain honeybee populations alongside wild pollinators, a ...structured understanding of beekeeper motivations is essential. UK beekeepers are increasing in number, with diverse management styles despite calls for coordinated practice to manage honeybee health. Our Q methodology study in Cornwall, UK, indicated five beekeeping perspectives; conventional hobbyists, natural beekeepers, black bee farmers, new-conventional hobbyists and pragmatic bee farmers. Motivations can be shared across perspectives but trade-offs (notably between economic, social responsibility and ideological motivations) result in differing practices, some of which counter ‘official’ UK advice and may have implications for pollinator health and competition. Honeybee conservation emerged as a key motivator behind non-conventional practices, but wild pollinator conservation was not
prioritised
by most beekeepers in practice. Q methodology has the potential to facilitate non-hierarchical collaboration and conceptualisation of sustainable beekeeping, moving towards co-production of knowledge to influence policy.
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