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Inferring plant-bee-microbe associations: Foragers, hive workers, and honey tell complementary stories
Jordan Twombly Ellis1, Alyssa R Cirtwill2, Emilie E Ellis3
1Department of Ecology, Environment and Geoscience, Umeå University, Umeå, Sweden.
Plos One
|July 8, 2026
Summary
Different methods for sampling pollinator-plant and pollinator-microbe associations reveal unique ecological insights. Honey DNA, hive bees, and individual bees each capture distinct aspects of honey bee interactions with their environment.
Area of Science:
- Ecology
- Microbiology
- Entomology
Background:
- Pollinator-plant and pollinator-microbe associations are crucial for ecosystem health.
- Sampling methods significantly influence the understanding of these complex interactions.
- Honey bees (Apis mellifera) serve as a model system for evaluating sampling techniques.
Purpose of the Study:
- To compare the effectiveness of different sampling methods for characterizing honey bee associations with plants and microbes.
- To determine if sampling honey, individual bees, or hive bee groups yields equivalent ecological data.
- To assess how DNA metabarcoding results vary across distinct sample types.
Main Methods:
- Collected honey, individual foraging bees, and groups of hive bees.
- Utilized DNA metabarcoding to identify plant and microbial taxa associated with each sample type.
- Compared the richness and community composition of taxa across honey, individual bee, and hive bee samples.
Main Results:
- Honey and hive bee samples revealed a greater diversity of plant and microbial taxa compared to individual bees.
- Associations identified from individual bees did not consistently represent a subset of those found in hive bees or honey.
- Each sampling method provided distinct, non-equivalent information on honey bee ecology.
Conclusions:
- DNA in honey offers a time-integrated view of bee-ecosystem interactions.
- Hive bee samples provide a current snapshot of colony-level associations.
- Individual bee samples highlight variations in foraging behavior and microbe exposure within the colony.
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