[Pollinator] Wild pollinators are catching honeybee viruses, possibly from pollen

[Scott Black]

Flower sharing may be unsafe for bees 

 

Wild pollinators are catching honeybee viruses, possibly from pollen 

 

By  <http://www.sciencenews.org/view/authored/id/70/name/Susan_Milius> Susan
Milius 

December 24, 2010 Web edition: 10:37 am 

 

 

 
<http://www.sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/68058/description/Flower_sharing
_may_be_unsafe_for_bees>
http://www.sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/68058/description/Flower_sharing_
may_be_unsafe_for_bees

 

 <http://www.sciencenews.org/view/access/id/68060/name/sm_48225421w.jpg>
access

 

RISKY JOB Groping around for pollen in a flower could expose a wild
bumblebee such as Bombus ternarius, shown here, to infection by honeybee
viruses. Beatriz Moisset/Wikimedia Commons

Eleven species of wild pollinators in the United States have turned up
carrying some of the viruses known to menace domestic honeybees, possibly
picked up via flower pollen.

Most of these native pollinators haven't been recorded with honeybee viruses
before, according to Diana Cox-Foster of Penn State University in University
Park. The new analysis raises the specter of diseases swapping around
readily among domestic and wild pollinators, Cox-Foster and her colleagues
report online December 22 in PLoS ONE.

Gone are any hopes that viral diseases in honeybees will stay in honeybees,
she says. "Movement of any managed pollinator may introduce viruses."

A pattern showed up in the survey that fits that unpleasant scenario.
Researchers tested for five viruses in pollinating insects and in their
pollen hauls near apiaries in Pennsylvania, New York and Illinois. Israeli
acute parasitic virus showed up in wild pollinators near honeybee
installations carrying the disease but not near apiaries without the virus.

In domestic honeybees, such viruses rank as one of the possible contributors
to the still-mysterious malady known as colony collapse disorder that
abruptly wipes out a hive's workforce, Cox-Foster says.

Now she and others are looking at what the viruses do to wild pollinators.
Preliminary results of ongoing lab tests show some disturbing effects,
Cox-Foster says. "Is this part of the reason why we've seen the decline of
native pollinator species in the U.S.?" she muses.

Surveys show that wild bumblebees, for example, are dwindling in numbers,
and the new study raises further concerns. "We recognize that those viruses
likely pose a major threat to wild bumblebees," says Sarina Jepsen of the
Xerces Society, an invertebrate conservation group in Portland, Ore.

One of the most interesting results in the study is the detection of
deformed-wing virus and sacbrood virus in pollen carried by foraging bees
that weren't infected themselves, comments Michelle Flenniken of the
University of California, San Francisco, who has studied bee viruses but was
not involved in the new work.

Healthy foraging insects carrying virus-laden pollen are one of the pieces
of evidence that Cox-Foster and her colleagues use to argue that pollen by
itself can transmit viral infections. "Knowing that viruses are found in and
can be transmitted from pollen is an important finding," says Flenniken.

This raises concerns about possible virus transmission through the 200 tons
of honeybee-collected pollen used to feed bumblebees in bee-raising
operations worldwide, Cox-Foster says.

 

 

 

*************************

Scott Hoffman Black

Executive Director

The Xerces Society for Invertebrate Conservation

Chair

IUCN (International Union for Conservation of Nature) Butterfly 

Specialist Group

4828 SE Hawthorne

Portland, OR 97215

Direct line (503) 449-3792

 <https://webmail.integra.net/src/compose.php?send_to=sblack%40xerces.org>
sblack at xerces.org

 

The Xerces Society is an international, nonprofit organization that 

protects wildlife through the conservation of invertebrates and their
habitat.

 

To join the Society, make a contribution, or read about our work,

please visit < <http://www.xerces.org/>
http://www.xerces.org/>www.xerces.org.

 

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