Pesticide use negatively affects bumble bees across European landscapes.

ABSTRACT: Sustainable agriculture requires balancing crop yields with the effects of pesticides on non-target organisms, such as bees and other crop pollinators. Field studies demonstrated that agricultural use of neonicotinoid insecticides can negatively affect wild bee species^1,2, leading to restrictions on these compounds³. However, besides neonicotinoids, field-based evidence of the effects of landscape pesticide exposure on wild bees is lacking. Bees encounter many pesticides in agricultural landscapes^4-9 and the effects of this landscape exposure on colony growth and development of any bee species remains unknown. Here we show that the many pesticides found in bumble bee-collected pollen are associated with reduced colony performance during crop bloom, especial

SUBMITTER: Nicholson CC 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC11006599 | biostudies-literature | 2024 Apr

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature