Multiple Routes of Pesticide Exposure for Honey Bees Living Near Agricultural Fields
By C. Krupke, G. Hunt, B. Eitzer, Gladys K. Andino, K. Given. PLoS ONE, 2012
850 citations recorded by the source corpus.
Populations of honey bees and other pollinators have declined worldwide in recent years. A variety of stressors have been implicated as potential causes, including agricultural pesticides. Neonicotinoid insecticides, which are widely used and highly toxic to honey bees, have been found in previous analyses of honey bee pollen and comb material. However, the routes of exposure have remained largely undefined. We used LC/MS-MS to analyze samples of honey bees, pollen stored in the hive and several potential exposure routes associated with plantings of neonicotinoid treated maize. Our results demonstrate that bees are exposed to these compounds and several other agricultural pesticides in several ways throughout the foraging period. During spring, extremely high levels of clothianidin and thiamethoxam were found in planter exhaust material produced during the planting of treated maize seed. We also found neonicotinoids in the soil of each field we sampled, including unplanted fields. Plants visited by foraging bees (dandelions) growing near these fields were found to contain neonicotinoids as well. This indicates deposition of neonicotinoids on the flowers, uptake by the root system, or both. Dead bees collected near hive entrances during the spring sampling period were found to contain clothianidin as well, although whether exposure was oral (consuming pollen) or by contact (soil/planter dust) is unclear. We also detected the insecticide clothianidin in pollen collected by bees and stored in the hive. When maize plants in our field reached anthesis, maize pollen from treated seed was found to contain clothianidin and other pesticides; and honey bees in our study readily collected maize pollen. These findings clarify some of the mechanisms by which honey bees may be exposed to agricultural pesticides throughout the growing season. These results have implications for a wide range of large-scale annual cropping systems that utilize neonicotinoid seed treatments.
Subfields: Ecology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics, Genetics, Insect Science
View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/325e79e51b31995cb46850ce29812b91ff4291aa
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Citations in the corpus
- REVIEW: An overview of the environmental risks posed by neonicotinoid insecticides (2013, background): “This aerial dust can be sufficient to cause direct mortality in honeybees flying nearby (Marzaro et al. 2011; Tapparo et al. 2012) and is deposited on field margin vegetation at concentrations ranging from 1 to 9 ppb (Krupke et al. 2012).”
- Bee declines driven by combined stress from parasites, pesticides, and lack of flowers (2015, background): “They are also watersoluble but highly persistent in soil and soil water, and as a result have been found at biologically relevant concentrations in the pollen and nectar of wildflowers near crops (63).”
- Neonicotinoid clothianidin adversely affects insect immunity and promotes replication of a viral pathogen in honey bees (2013, background): “1 to 10 ppb, thus matching contamination levels occurring under field conditions (13, 50, 51).”
- Chronic impairment of bumblebee natural foraging behaviour induced by sublethal pesticide exposure (2014, background): “Moreover, neonicotinoid residues are known to be found in nearby non-agricultural plants (for example in field borders, Krupke et al. 2012) and have been found to persist in soils at high concentra- tions (see Goulson 2013).”
- Influence of combined pesticide and parasite exposure on bumblebee colony traits in the laboratory (2014, background): “Further, additional neonicotinoid exposure routes via non-crop resources may be possible (Krupke et al. 2012).”
- Insect pollinators collect pollen from wind‐pollinated plants: implications for pollination ecology and sustainable agriculture (2018, background): “However, high pesticide use in wind-pollinated crop systems may have serious impacts on local pollinator populations (Krupke et al., 2012; Hladik et al., 2016).”
- Effects of neonicotinoids and fipronil on non-target invertebrates (2014, neutral): “…occurs through exposure to the dust cloud around the pneumatic sowing machines during foraging flights to adjacent forests (providing honeydew) or nearby flowering fields (Apenet 2010; Girolami et al. 2012; Tapparo et al. 2012; Krupke et al. 2012; Pochi et al. 2012; Tapparo et al. 2012).”
- Bees and pesticide regulation: Lessons from the neonicotinoid experience (2020, methodology): “Flowers in the surroundings of corn fields were being contaminated with neonicotinoid-loaded dust from the abrasion of the coated seeds generated by the pneumatic sowing machines (Greatti et al., 2003; Krupke et al., 2012).”
- Planting of neonicotinoid‐treated maize poses risks for honey bees and other non‐target organisms over a wide area without consistent crop yield benefit (2017, neutral): “…the lethal contact dose for clothianidin and thiamethoxam residues, both in terms of previously observed lethal exposures to planting dust residues (Krupke et al. 2012; Tapparo et al. 2012; Girolami et al. 2013) and laboratory assays with topical application of the active ingredients to honey bees…”
- Impact of Neonicotinoids to Aquatic Invertebrates—In Vitro Studies on Mytilus galloprovincialis: A Review (2020, background): “This dust may be sufficient to cause direct mortality in bees flying in that area [8–10] and also settles along the vegetation found at the edge of the field [8,11], then reaching bodies of water.”
- Standard methods for toxicology research in Apis mellifera (2013, background): “…name, race, approximate age (in weeks), collection method, date of collection; Several bee mortalities in Europe and USA have been linked with contaminated dust dispersed during maize sowing operations (Alix et al., 2009; Bortolotti et al., 2009; Pistorius et al., 2009; Krupke et al., 2012).”