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Updated: Feb 1, 2026
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Monitoring Colony-level Effects of Sublethal Pesticide Exposure on Honey Bees
Published on: November 15, 2017
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Quantitative multi-locus metabarcoding and waggle dance interpretation reveal honey bee spring foraging patterns in
Rodney T Richardson1, Hailey R Curtis2, Emma G Matcham3
1Department of Entomology, The Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio.
Molecular Ecology
|December 15, 2018
Summary
Honey bees in Ohio agricultural areas primarily foraged on woody Rosaceae, Salix, and Trifolium. These bees preferred forests and tree lines over crop fields for essential pollen resources.
Area of Science:
- Ecology
- Molecular Biology
- Agriculture
Background:
- Honey bee colonies are vital for pollination in agricultural ecosystems.
- Understanding honey bee foraging behavior is crucial for crop production and bee health.
- Agroecosystems dominated by corn and soybeans present unique challenges for bee nutrition.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate honey bee pollen foraging behavior in corn and soybean agroecosystems.
- To analyze spatial foraging patterns using pollen metabarcoding and waggle dance inference.
- To develop cost-effective molecular methods for pollen analysis.
Main Methods:
- Pollen metabarcoding targeting four plant barcode loci (ITS2, rbcL, trnL, trnH).
- Development of laboratory and bioinformatics protocols to minimize biases.
- Construction of reference databases for taxonomic classification using metaxa2.
- Comparison of molecular palynology with traditional morphological methods.
Main Results:
- Consistent honey bee foraging habits were observed across different locations.
- Clear trends in the phenological progression of spring foraging were identified.
- Woody Rosaceae, Salix, and Trifolium were the primary pollen sources.
- Foraging patterns showed a preference for forests and tree lines over crop fields.
Conclusions:
- Multi-locus pollen metabarcoding is a reliable quantitative method for palynology.
- Honey bee foraging in these agroecosystems is influenced by floral resource availability and landscape structure.
- Conservation strategies should consider preserving forest and tree line habitats to support bee nutrition.
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