Wizenberg Sydney B, French Sarah K, Newburn Laura R, Pepinelli Mateus, Conflitti Ida M, Moubony Mashaba, Ritchie Caroline, Jamieson Aidan, Richardson Rodney T, Travas Anthea, Imrit Mohammed Arshad, Chihata Matthew, Higo Heather, Common Julia, Walsh Elizabeth M, Bixby Miriam, Guarna M Marta, Pernal Stephen F, Hoover Shelley E, Currie Robert W, Giovenazzo Pierre, Guzman-Novoa Ernesto, Borges Daniel, Foster Leonard J, Zayed Amro
Department of Biology, York University, Toronto, ON, Canada M3J 1P3.
Western EcoSystems Technology, Inc., Indianapolis, IN 47404, USA.
PNAS Nexus. 2024 Oct 18;3(10):pgae440. doi: 10.1093/pnasnexus/pgae440. eCollection 2024 Oct.
Recent declines in the health of honey bee colonies used for crop pollination pose a considerable threat to global food security. Foraging by honey bee workers represents the primary route of exposure to a plethora of toxins and pathogens known to affect bee health, but it remains unclear how foraging preferences impact colony-level patterns of stressor exposure. Resolving this knowledge gap is crucial for enhancing the health of honey bees and the agricultural systems that rely on them for pollination. To address this, we carried out a national-scale experiment encompassing 456 Canadian honey bee colonies to first characterize pollen foraging preferences in relation to major crops and then explore how foraging behavior influences patterns of stressor exposure. We used a metagenetic approach to quantify honey bee dietary breadth and found that bees display distinct foraging preferences that vary substantially relative to crop type and proximity, and the breadth of foraging interactions can be used to predict the abundance and diversity of stressors a colony is exposed to. Foraging on diverse plant communities was associated with increased exposure to pathogens, while the opposite was associated with increased exposure to xenobiotics. Our work provides the first large-scale empirical evidence that pollen foraging behavior plays an influential role in determining exposure to dichotomous stressor syndromes in honey bees.
用于作物授粉的蜂群健康状况近期出现下降，这对全球粮食安全构成了相当大的威胁。蜜蜂工蜂觅食是接触大量已知会影响蜜蜂健康的毒素和病原体的主要途径，但目前尚不清楚觅食偏好如何影响蜂群层面的应激源暴露模式。解决这一知识空白对于提高蜜蜂健康以及依赖蜜蜂授粉的农业系统的健康至关重要。为了解决这个问题，我们开展了一项全国范围的实验，涵盖456个加拿大蜂群，首先确定与主要作物相关的花粉觅食偏好，然后探究觅食行为如何影响应激源暴露模式。我们采用宏基因组学方法来量化蜜蜂的饮食广度，发现蜜蜂表现出明显的觅食偏好，这些偏好因作物类型和距离而有很大差异，觅食相互作用的广度可用于预测蜂群接触的应激源的丰度和多样性。在多样化植物群落上觅食与接触病原体增加有关，而相反情况则与接触异生素增加有关。我们的研究首次提供了大规模实证证据，表明花粉觅食行为在决定蜜蜂接触二分应激源综合征方面发挥着重要作用。
